


R&R

by Footloose



Series: Loaded March [3]
Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M, Military
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-10
Updated: 2011-09-10
Packaged: 2017-10-23 15:00:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 56,881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/251615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Footloose/pseuds/Footloose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Team Excalibur's prize was two weeks of R&R, but it's not all fun and games.  Arthur is determined to keep his squad ready for whatever mission the Brass will toss at them next, and that means getting in touch with old friends, learning about the impossible, and trusting Merlin.</p>
            </blockquote>





	R&R

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Español available: [R&R](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1194813) by [Aisjustrunning](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aisjustrunning/pseuds/Aisjustrunning)



> I don't own the characters to Merlin(TV) and am not profiting from this work.
> 
> This is part three in the Loaded March series, and it's non-beta'd for Britishisms and military warfare. Any mistakes are solely my own.
> 
> Fair warning: this is a military fic, and there will be military violence.

Merlin spent the week trying not to think.

It wasn't easy. When he wasn't running patrols, when he wasn't helping the quartermaster shout at some of the young recruits who'd arrived on base and promptly began their military careers by fouling the equipment, when the others weren't around...

He tried to distract himself, to come up with something else to think about. He really did. But his brain was like an infinity gerbil running on a wheel, and it kept running. And running.

Fortunately -- or unfortunately, depending on how Merlin looked at it -- Arthur seemed to have a knack for showing up exactly when Merlin was about to have a meltdown. Arthur would yell at Merlin to clean up his bunk of all the bits and pieces that were hooked onto his blanket ("But I might need them!" "For what? Your science fair project? We already know you're a giant nerd, _Mer_ lin!"). Or he would tell Merlin to stop staring at the ceiling and do something productive, like, oh, taking that morning's stinky pile of post-PT clothing to the laundry ("I thought we had privates doing that!" "And they didn't show up again, so I'm asking you to do it. Now, _Mer_ lin. Before it stinks up the tent."). Or, he would breeze past in his arse-hugging slacks and tight olive-green shirt and sit on the bed across from Merlin's where the boys were playing poker and say, "Deal me in", and Merlin would stare and stare and finally look away, pretending that he wasn't sneaking peeks at Arthur from over the top of his book.

For the most part, the not-thinking project worked, but now that they were on a plane, heading for RAF airfield Norholt -- it was the third plane of the long trip home, because getting home from the base when their R&R started out of the usual rota meant that there was no direct flight -- the wheels in his brain started turning again.

He supposed he could try to concentrate on his book (the same book that he pretended to read when the boys were playing poker), but Arthur had walked down the aisle twice so far in the last thirty minutes, and part of the reason why Merlin was trying not to think was all Arthur's fault.

What had he been thinking in accepting Arthur's offer to crash at his place?

It took Merlin all of five minutes to decide that it was a toss-up between _he hadn't been thinking at all_ and _some other part of his body had been doing his thinking for him at the time_.

"So, I didn't ask," Gwaine said, sliding into the empty seat next to Merlin. "What are your plans?"

"You did ask. About a billion times," Merlin said, glancing down at his book. His thumb held it open on the same page that he'd dog-eared at their transit point in Italy, and it didn't look that he was going to get much past that page anytime soon.

"Did you tell me?"

Merlin sighed. "Yes, I did. About a billion times. You know, I figured out that you weren't listening during the spitball fight, and that maybe you got sidetracked when you got up and followed the cadet to the bathroom on the last flight, but I'm pretty sure I had your complete attention at the terminal because Owain over there was snoring and no one else was talking to you."

Gwaine leaned over to look at Owain one aisle over, sprawled over a seat and a half and snoring again. Or still snoring -- Merlin wasn't entirely certain that he'd woken up before getting on the plane.

Perceval sat up a little straighter and looked over the back of his chair at them. "Didn't you know? Gwaine's the poster boy for attention deficit."

"I'll have you know that I'm their top draw," Gwaine retorted. "How could anyone resist this?"

Gwaine waved a hand up and down his body, with particular emphasis on his face. Merlin had to admit that Gwaine was a good-looking bloke. His shaggy brown hair was cut to military regs but somehow managed to look as if a top stylist, and not the base butcher, had given him a trim. His eyes crinkled with laugher and sparkled whenever he was amused. His smile was big and bright and easy, fuelled by a nigh-mystical charm that seemed to operate on perpetual fuel. And, just like the rest of the team, he was fit.

Gwaine was a bit of a rogue, a bit of a playboy, brash and swashbuckling, and he wouldn't look out of place in a pirate movie.

Anybody would be lucky to have him. It wouldn't be Merlin.

"And yet we all manage," Perceval said. He turned around in his seat, crossed his arms over the top, and loomed over them, his head hitting on the tiny, useless lights and tiny, useless ventilation fans overhead.

"You all don't know what you're missing. It's not too late for Merlin. I'll convert him yet," Gwaine retorted. He turned to Merlin. "Tell me again. What are your plans?"

"Take my Mum to the airport for her trip, visit my uncle, try to keep you lot out of trouble," Merlin said.

What he didn't say was: _And when I have free time, I'll be not-thinking about the Sidhe working for the Americans trying to send us after enemy sorcerers and how I'll keep everyone alive while not letting on how I'm doing it. But most importantly, I'll be biting through a pillow while I'm wanking at night because the last thing I want is for Arthur to hear me at it._

Merlin wasn't sure what he was more worried about. At least that Aulfric guy and the Sophia woman didn't notice that he was capable of magic. He hadn't known -- still didn't know -- what to make of Daly talking about Aredian and Mordred's abilities as if they were products of technology. Was the CIA agent putting them on? Did the Americans really not know about magic? And how could they not, what with Aulfric and Sophia sitting right there at the table next to him during the debriefing?

"Oh, no, no, no," Gwaine exclaimed. "That can't be all. No, hold on..."

Arthur was walking up the aisle again, but Gwaine's hand snaked out, caught him, and hauled him back. "Arthur! Merlin's been wearing the red for more than a month. Don't you suppose it's time to --"

Arthur's tropical-sky blues pinned Merlin to his seat, and his smug little smile robbed Merlin's ability to breath.

"I haven't forgotten. I have it all under control," he said, and he almost sounded like Morgana right then, terrifying and mysterious in a way that hinted maybe Merlin should crack open the airlock and jump out of the plane right now, because jumping out without a parachute was probably safer than whatever Arthur had planned.

"We'll be landing soon, sir. Can you take your seat." A pretty blond aircrew cadet appeared behind Arthur and fluttered her eyes at him at hummingbird speeds.

Merlin resisted the eye-roll that threatened to escape, and he swallowed down the groan of despair that obviously, Arthur wasn't into blokes, because Arthur gave her a flirty smile and a solicitous, "Of course. I'm sorry about that. Just one second, if you don't mind, so that I can get this bunch to settle down."

The cadet smiled at him and went to the front of the plane.

"Just remember. Tonight's the pub, tomorrow's family day, and the day after that, I want everyone to meet up for the run, then we'll head over to the gym for PT. After that, it's brekkie at Lance's, the footie game, and..." Arthur gestured toward Merlin.

"That's aces, mate," Gwaine said with a grin, and Perceval reached over to pat Merlin reassuringly on the shoulder. Merlin felt the heavy weight of dread settle in his stomach. It could've been the change in altitude.

Arthur went to claim his seat, Perceval sat down and buckled up, and Gwaine stretched out next to Merlin. "From the sounds of it, I'm guessing that you lot have a routine down?"

"You know it." Gwaine studied him for a second, and raised a brow. "Look, mate, since we teamed up, we've come home and done the same thing every time. It's what makes it coming home. Besides, no one wants to mess with tradition."

The last few words came with the familiar warning weight of _you'd better not try_. Excalibur wasn't any different than any other SAS team -- or any other soldier. Everyone had their secret superstitions and routines that they didn't dare break in case they'd also be breaking the streak of luck that would bring them home.

Merlin didn't have anything like that. He did, once, ages ago. A coin he kept in his pocket, a phone number tucked in the band of his cap, a particular way that he got dressed in the morning or how he put together his gear. But all that got blown to bits along with nearly the rest of his team, nearly the rest of him.

He glanced over at Gwaine. The sniper's usual steady nerves were betrayed by a jiggly leg, his knee bouncing up and down in the aisle. Owain continued to snore. Perceval stretched out his arms and grumbled something about narrow seats. And Arthur, somewhere behind them, was laughing at someone's joke.

Merlin smiled to himself. Maybe it was time for new superstitions and new routines. Whatever Arthur had planned... How bad could it be?

They landed, they were cleared, they filed paperwork -- it wasn't their usual base, and that meant a lot more paperwork -- and they stowed their gear. By the time they were done, it was well past midnight.

Merlin slipped away while the others were securing transport, and found a phone. It rang three times before someone answered.

"Uncle Gaius! I'm really sorry if I woke you up, but --"

"My boy! You're home! --" There was a bit of a scuffle on the other end of the line, and Merlin could tell that his Mum had won the battle when her voice came over the line. He wasn't surprised; she fought dirty when she wanted to.

"Merlin!"

"Mum! I didn't mean to wake you up --"

"Nonsense, I was still up --"

"-- but we've only just landed --"

"-- waiting for you to call --"

"-- and I wanted to call to let you know I'm taking the tube over --"

"-- to tell me what time you'll be here --"

"-- and I'll borrow Uncle Gaius' beater to drive you to the airport --"

"-- to take me to the airport..."

They both stopped talking at the same time, and there was a brief moment of silence before they both burst into laughter. Merlin recovered first. "Mum! I'll see you tomorrow like I promised. Get some sleep, yeah?"

"Not a minute late, young man. Hannah swore up and down that she would save me a seat but Meredith might have weaseled her way onto the trip even though she's been complaining all this time that it would be horrid, and a team of draft horses wouldn't get her on board. I am not losing my seat to that woman."

Merlin grinned. "You won't, Mum."

"Oh! Will called, wanting to find out where you'd be landing. I hope you don't mind that I told him. He said he didn't think that he'd make it out. You really should give him a call. He said he's been bored out of his skull since you transferred."

Merlin suppressed a disappointed twinge in his gut. It would have been nice to have seen Will. The team was starting to feel like family, but there were times when he still felt like an outsider looking in and he ached for someone who _knew_ him, like Will did, who understood his silences, who knew his secrets. Half the time, though, he felt like he would burst apart and no one would know how to put him back together. "I will, Mum. I'll call him tomorrow. Are you going to keep me on the phone all night, or are you going to get some sleep so that you're in fighting form when you face off with your nemesis on the plane?"

That started Hunith off on a rant that was cut short by a gruff Gaius on the other end of the line, sending his sister off to bed. "Merlin?"

"Yes, Uncle Gaius?"

"Don't be late. Please." Gaius sounded tired the way he sounded tired every time he dealt with Hurricane Hunith, and Merlin chuckled.

"I won't. Goodnight."

When he hung up, Arthur was there, down the corridor, watching him with that usual strange look he had sometimes when he watched Merlin, and he asked, "Everything all right?"

"Yeah. Just calling my Mum." He gave Arthur a shrug. "You know. Rules."

"Rules," Arthur said quietly, with the sort of brief absence that meant he wasn't there with Merlin anymore, lost somewhere in his own thoughts, but just as abruptly he was back, gesturing over his shoulder. "Speaking of rules. We're off to the pub. Let's go."

It wasn't their usual base, and it wasn't their usual off-base pub, but it wasn't unfamiliar, either, Merlin learned, because Team Excalibur came home however they could when they scored R&R. Drinks, Family, PT, Brekkie, Footie -- that was the start of the checklist of a wind-down routine, and no step could be skipped or avoided on pain of death. The first round was on Arthur.

"To one more," Arthur said simply, raising his ale, and they all drank in solemn silence that lingered well after the pint glasses clinked on the table, broken only by Owain's loud, crude burp. That, apparently, was also tradition. Perceval's shove sent Owain to the ground with a thump, nearly scattering everyone's drinks.

"Oi!"

"You belched in my ear! I'm going to be hearing the ocean for weeks!"

"Not my fault your head's shaped like a conch shell," Owain retorted, brushing himself off. "Or that it's empty."

"I don't know about that, I always thought there were at least a few pebbles rattling around in there," Lance said, hiding his smirk behind his glass before taking a sip.

Gwaine went to stand right behind Perceval, his head tilted toward the bigger man's, frowning in concentration. "Hey, Perce, shake your head."

"Why?"

"I want to see who's right -- Owain or Lance. Go on, shake. I might be able to hear a rattle."

Perceval rolled his eyes and tilted his head from side to side good-naturedly, stopping to look at Gwaine expectantly.

"Nah. Nothing." Gwaine knocked on Perceval's head for good measure. "Empty."

Abruptly, Perceval stood up, towering over Gwaine. Gwaine flashed a smile that bordered on _you know I was kidding?_ and _you're not going to hit me, you like me too much_ before taking the slippery slope toward _oh, shite!_. He ducked away from Perceval's big hand and used the crowd to help his escape, Perceval on his heels.

Merlin saw them setting up at the pool table a few minutes later and chuckled.

Leon brought the second round, and that was some sort of unspoken signal, because the base bunnies approached their table and stopping short to linger close enough for the team to appreciate their porn star come-hither poses. Most of the team didn't pay them any mind, because they had wives or girlfriends waiting for them, but that didn't stop the most brazen from coming so close that they were practically on display on the table.

Merlin moved his pint before it could get knocked off.

"Arrrrthur," one of the women purred, a bottle-blonde with nasty dark roots bursting out of her head said, trying to make herself at home in his lap. Merlin glanced at Lance, who demurred quietly away from another girl, and at Leon, who smirked and went to join the boys at the pool tables before he was targeted. Merlin risked a glance at Arthur. His expression was bored and resigned, as if he were biding his time until he could politely get rid the abnormal growth on his lap.

"I didn't think I'd see you again," the woman said, still purring. "When was the last time you came by this way?"

"A couple of months," Gareth volunteered. He counted on his fingers. "No, it's been about a year now, hasn't it? Gosh, Arthur, weren't you just telling me how much you liked it when we landed near here?"

"Yes, thank you, Gareth," Arthur said, using his read-between-the-lines voice, and in-between-the-lines, there was a very not-subtle, _you're not helping_ that made Merlin hide a grin behind his beer.

"You'll be taking me home this time," the woman said, wriggling on Arthur's lap. It wasn't a question or even a suggestion; it was an order, and orders like that didn't go over very well with Arthur.

Merlin never felt the urge to slap a woman more than he did now.

"I'm with the boys. If you don't mind, we'd like to chat, so how about you..." Arthur tilted his head in a get-lost gesture. When the woman showed no signs of leaving, Arthur added, a little gentler, "Come back later."

She leaned in and planted a sloppy kiss on Arthur's lips, smearing cherry-red lipstick in the process, and it was over before Arthur could decide if he wanted to return it or push her away. Still, the damage was done, because the woman got up with a smile of triumph -- she'd marked her prey, and woe betide the base bunny that wandered into her territory.

Merlin couldn't decide if Arthur looked stunned, surprised, or bemused. He was too busy admiring the way the kiss had stained Arthur's lips with colour, and Merlin desperately tried to get a grip on his thoughts before they hopped onto a runaway train headed for a disastrous wreck.

When she was gone, Arthur's eyes found Gareth, who withered like someone who very much wanted to hide inside his glass, but he was grinning, and Lance was hiding another smirk, and Gwaine and Leon had rejoined them. He raised a brow as Arthur wiped his mouth with a napkin, removing the lipstick smear, and glanced around. "What did I miss?"

"A lap dance, apparently," Merlin said, pointing with one finger toward Arthur.

Gwaine's scoffed. "Obviously meant for me."

"She's all yours," Arthur said, gesturing in the blonde's direction.

Gwaine checked her out without hiding his interest. "Wasted on you anyway."

Arthur glanced at Merlin, and Merlin wasn't sure if it was just the spectacularly bad lighting in the pub, or if his eyes were playing tricks on him, but had Arthur blushed? Just as quickly, Arthur looked away, leaving Merlin a little out of the loop again, not knowing something that everyone else in the team seemed to know, and not wanting to ask.

He drank his beer instead.

"You don't call, you don't write," a familiar voice boomed right behind Merlin, and he put down his glass and stood up before Will could finish the familiar litany of complaints, "And you didn't have the decency to order me a beer."

"Will!" The two men threw arms around each other in a tight back-beating hug, both letting go at the same time. Merlin's grin came out in a laugh. "Mum said you didn't think you'd make it."

"Between us, mate, I didn't, all right? My pass is only worth a few hours, and Sam -- that's Samantha over there," Will said, pointing toward a lovely brunette in pilot's uniform, which led Merlin to notice that Will was wearing his on-base greens. "Offered me a hop down, and a hop back once they're finished loading up her supply run, so when the lady whistles, it'll be time for me to go, or she'll leave me without my pumpkin ride back home."

"So she's the fairy godmother and you're playing the part of Cinderella?" Merlin grinned.

"Fuck that. If anything, I'm Prince Charming and you're the bird wobbling about in high-heeled stripper slippers," Will snorted. He looked past Merlin and gestured. "So what's this lot, then?"

Merlin turned, a hand on Will's arm, pulling him closer to the table. He made a round of introductions, starting from the left all around, and ending with "That's Gwaine, Leon, Arthur and Lance, and over there, guarding the drinks, that's Gareth. Owain and Perceval are over at the pool table with the rest of the team. This is Will, my best mate."

Will nodded curtly, shaking hands with each of them over the city of glass pints, and Merlin didn't miss how he pointedly kept Arthur for last, and squeezed the other man's hand in a grip that had his knuckles turning white. Merlin groaned inwardly -- it was Will's God-given natural hated of anything that remotely resembled authority rearing its ugly head again. If Arthur noticed, he didn't react.

"So you're SAS too?" Gwaine asked, nodding toward the patch on Will's arm.

Will took a seat next to Merlin. "Yeah, up at the Artists on a training tour for another six months. I got seconded to teach sniper school while Mawls Gibson's out on an active. You're the team's shooter, right?"

Gwaine shot Merlin a brief glance and a grin before nodding. "I know my way around a scope."

Leon spat out his mouthful of ale, and coughed in a choking fit. Lance handed him a napkin, while Gareth wiped his face of saliva and spew with a muttered, "Thanks, mate," heading to the Men's to go and clean himself up.

"I think something's wrong with my ears. Did I hear right?" Leon asked, poking a finger in his ear and wriggling. "Was Gwaine being _modest_?"

"Sure sounded like it to me," Lance said.

"Fuck, mate, you'd better get your med kit and check him out. I don't think he's feeling well," Leon said.

Gwaine flew the two fingered salute in both their directions. "As if I'm going to fly my banners around someone who's covering for Mawls. Do you have any idea what Mawls' record is like? And what this one's log must be if he got picked to cover?"

"I can hit the broadside of a barn sometimes," Will said, shrugging a demurring shoulder, and it was Merlin's turn to spit out a disbelieving mouthful of beer before it went down the wrong pipe.

Gareth had the misfortune to come walking back right then, and most of it landed on his shirt and pants. The man came to a startled stop, stared down at himself, glared at the table, and asked, "Seriously? Twice in a row? Anyone else want to have a go before I mop myself up?"

Lance offered him a single flimsy cocktail square. Gareth picked it up with two fingertips and a raised brow while Merlin tried to cough out an apology, and was gone for a second round in the washroom before the table stopped laughing.

Will and Gwaine grinned at each other and spontaneously raised hands into high-fives.

"You two," Merlin said, waving a finger between them. "It's evil that you're getting along. Don't make me separate you."

Will glanced at Gwaine again, and with a glint Merlin knew too well, helped himself to Merlin's glass, finishing off the pint. "Let's get rid of you, then, so that I can hear what you've been up to."

"Oi, that was mine," Merlin protested.

"And now it's gone. Go and get yourself another one. While you're at it, get me a pint and take your time --"

"No, no," Merlin said, knowing the predatory glint in everyone's eyes -- especially Arthur's. "I'm not leaving you with these ones. They'll ask you about me, and you've got a big gob. I'm not having that. You need adult supervision. I have a better idea. You're coming with me."

He stood up, grabbed a handful of the scruff of Will's neck, and hauled him out of his seat with a creak and tumble. He didn't let go until they placed their orders. Merlin paid for a third pint, that one an apology meant for Gareth.

"Seems like a nice lot," Will remarked, leaning against the bar. "Not sure about him, though."

 _Him_ was Arthur, and Merlin didn't need to look to see who Will was pointing at with a sharp jab of his finger.

"He's not so bad," Merlin said, ignoring the heat that threatened to reach his cheeks.

"Not so bad? What, are you suddenly sweet on him? Every time you call, you spend ten minutes ranting about Captain Prat. He's just as smug as you said he was. Can't believe he treats you the way he does, or that you let him, either. Why haven't you --" Will wriggled his fingers in the air, raised a meaningful brow, and finished with, "-- put starch in his shorts or something?"

Merlin hesitated, glancing at Arthur's profile. His attention must have lingered a bit too long, because Will's eyes widened.

"No."

"No, what?"

"No. Absolutely not. You've not... Not with him? Jesus, Merlin, he's your _superior officer_ ," Will hissed, keeping his voice down.

"It's not like that. Anyway, he doesn't swing that way," Merlin said, his stomach souring as he said it. He crossed his arms on the bar and stared down at the froth on his pint.

"Too right he doesn't, if he knows what's good for him," Will said. He reached for one of the pints the bartender put in front of them, and Merlin whistled Gareth over, putting the third in his hand.

"You're aces, mate, but next time, swallow, yeah? Gets a bit messy otherwise." Gareth raised his glass with a mocking grin before heading back to the table. Arthur turn in his seat to watch Merlin with Will, and Merlin ignored him. Or at least, he really tried to.

"All you've got to do is shag some bloke and get it out of your system. You've got a couple of weeks, right? Shag someone every night. Two, even. Shag someone for me," Will said, though he waited for Gareth to be out of earshot and for the jukebox music to start up again. He glanced toward the table, but made no move to head back there.

Merlin rolled his eyes. "Yes, fine, I'll shag half of lower London if it'll make you happy."

"Only because you're leaving the female half to me," Will said, and he studied Merlin with a gaze that peeled back whatever Merlin was trying to hide. "What's on your mind, then?"

"Between us, yeah?" Merlin asked, raising both eyebrows the way he did when he wanted to make damn sure Will was serious. When Will put down his pint and slid closer, nodding with rapt and complete attention, Merlin continued in Welsh, his voice low and soft, "You remember those toffs in school? Cadoc, Bryn, Tris and the others? You hung out with them sometimes, yeah?"

When Will nodded again, Merlin continued, "What about that new world order shite they kept talking about? That ring any bells?"

Will turned his head and stared at Merlin intently, and said, "You mean, that cult bollocks? The thing about our generation doing away with everyone else?"

"It was just a load of cack, yeah?" Merlin didn't like how Will's jaw clenched or how his eyes narrowed. "Come on, Will. What do you know about it?"

"Why are you asking? You hearing about them out there?" Will tilted his head in a random direction that could only mean wherever it was that Merlin's active duty had taken him. There must have been something in Merlin's expression, because Will cursed, and said, "Sod security clearances and sod secrets and sod the NWO. Never thought that pseudo-political joke of a cult would last this long or make it out that far."

"Will!"

"I don't know anything about them. Not anymore anyway, and not since they strung you upside down naked in the schoolyard."

Merlin flinched. "Thanks for the memory."

"Yeah, well, your damn own fault for being such a fucking bookworm. Tristan hated your guts since you showed him up in maths. He might've been a toff, but he lost his scholarship because of you, and the only reason you still have your nuts is because I had double detention that day and walked out at the right time."

"My nuts and my future partner thank you," Merlin said dryly. "So, if you don't know anything about them, who would know?"

"I don't know. You want to talk to Tristan? Maybe Bryn? I know Bryn's out of the nick, and Tris is some muckety-muck somewhere... I'm sure they'd love to hear from you -- probably want a second go at you with the upside-down naked thing and the knife on the scrotums. No, wait. I know. Freya."

"Freya?" A cold flash went down Merlin's spine and he stood up straight, almost knocking over his drink. He hadn't thought about Freya in ages, and a pang of guilt settled in his stomach. She'd never been lucky, growing up, with a lout for a father and a mother half-drowning in drink every day, and came to school in skirts that might as well have been burlap sacks. That wasn't her only trouble, either, and when Merlin stumbled on her covered in blood one day, a dead sheep at her feet, he made the connection between the newspaper articles on mutilated livestock and Freya. "What's she doing with them?"

"Started dating Bryn after you left. Couple of weeks after, I think. You know, she cried a whole lot when you were gone and he was there to pick up the pieces. I can't believe you never told her you were a poof. I swear she had a massive crush on you."

Will didn't know about Freya's monstrous shape -- the closest that Merlin could come to describing it was one of those bad costumed B-movie werewolves -- or that the only reason Merlin spent as much time with her as he did was out of self-preservation. If he could keep Freya calm, then the monster didn't come out.

"I didn't know that," Merlin said quietly. He really hadn't. He just thought that they were good friends. The silence stretched, the guilt gained a few hundred pounds and curved his shoulders, and he rubbed his eyes. Freya with Bryn. "Is she still with him?"

"Yeah, most like," Will said, sipping his beer. He eyed Merlin out of the corner of his eye. "You know, she might talk to you. You want me to get her number?"

"Could you?"

"Could do," Will said. "You'll be careful? I mean, Bryn's probably not got any nicer."

"I've not got my nose in a book anymore, do I?" Merlin grunted. "I'll be careful. If all else fails, I'll just starch his shorts."

Will grinned. He turned to the bartender and waved for another drink. "You know, we should go back to your lot over there. We stay out here any longer, I swear Captain Prat'll burn holes through my back."

Merlin frowned, and he glanced over his shoulder at the table, but all he saw was Arthur hunched over the table, speaking quietly to Leon.

 

  


**ooOOoo**  


 

"Damn it," Gwaine growled. "He does this every time. Every time!"

"Who does the what now?" Lance asked, putting down his pint.

"Merlin! Every time we get close to getting some real answers about him, he ducks and dodges like fucking Houdini." Gwaine threw up his arms in complaint.

Arthur nursed his beer, but it tasted foul on his tongue. The beer nuts were off and going stale, the atmosphere subdued, the music was filtered through thick cotton. All the life went out of the room the very instant that Merlin's expression lit up like a kid at Christmas when he heard Will's voice. The kick in the gut came when Merlin threw himself into Will's arms.

 _Best mate_ , Merlin said. They were best mates. Arthur swallowed a scoff. It didn't look like they were best mates. Arthur knew what best mates looked like, and they didn't throw themselves into each other's arms. Did Gwaine try to snog Perceval when they hadn't seen each other in a few days? Did Owain blubber like a baby when Leon finally showed up? Arthur certainly didn't simper after Lance when Lance trudged into the barracks after a late night in the MASH tent.

"I'm sure the party will take care of that, right, Arthur?" Lance asked.

Arthur wasn't really listening to the others, but a lifetime under Uther's military regime and growing up with Morgana taught him one very important lesson: repeating the last few words of someone else's conversation implied that he was paying attention. "Yeah, it'll be taken care of."

"See? Christ, Gwaine, you'd think you were buggering a secret agent or something, the way you keep nosing into everyone's business," Leon said.

"You know, if Merlin doesn't want to talk about his life, then he doesn't have to," Lance pointed out.

"Yes, he does," Gwaine grumbled, swallowing a mouthful of his ale. "For example. That. Look at them two."

Arthur couldn't help himself. He glanced over his shoulder. The tight knot in his stomach tightened until it was so taut, he felt he might snap in two, as if his body was strapped to some medieval torture device that cranked it up a notch more every time Will did something or Merlin did something to hint that maybe they were just a little bit more than "best mates".

If there was anything that Arthur had noticed about Merlin in his few months with Excalibur, it was that Merlin was not a tactile person. Where the rest of the team freely pounded others on the back, grabbed people's arms, stayed in close for private conversations, Merlin kept his arms at his side, his hands to himself, and if he could, he'd duck away from anyone who'd sling an arm over his shoulders on the walk to -- or from -- the base pub. Arthur wasn't the only one to notice -- everyone else had, too, and there was a secret campaign to break Merlin in, to show him that it was all right, that they weren't just a team, they were friends, they were family. And, still, months later, Merlin shoved his hands in his pockets, shrugged in an aw-shucks sort of way instead of smacking people on the arm, offered congratulations for a successful mission and relief-that-they're-safe with words instead of an embrace, and ducked his head in an embarrassed flush whenever Gwaine or Perceval or Leon or even Arthur dropped an arm on his shoulder.

Arthur had begun to think that he would never get Merlin to spontaneously express any kind of attachment to the team, to his friends, to _him_ , that it simply wasn't part of Merlin's personality, that his genetic code was missing the DNA that said that a friendly pat on the back was _all right_ and not at all offensive or wrong. He was ready to accept that Merlin would never be comfortable with physical contact.

 _Look at them two,_ Gwaine said, and Arthur was looking, and he wasn't liking what he saw.

Will and Merlin were standing next to each other at the bar, standing close. Will's elbow brushed Merlin's arm; Merlin put a friendly hand on Will's back; Will leaned in to whisper in Merlin's ear; Merlin leaned in to listen. There were errant touches and gestures, a rewriting of the rules of personal space, and a complete violation of those rules because there didn't seem to be _any_ personal space between them at all. It was the body language that was the most telling. They way they stood next to each other, how they leaned in, how they touched, whispered, laughed -- it betrayed complete trust in one another, a long, deep-seated affection, and hints that it was humanely possible to be close to Merlin.

It made Arthur's heart hurt. Why wouldn't Merlin let _him_ get that close?

"I mean, who here thinks they're maybe more than _best mates_?" Gwaine asked.

"Just you," Perceval said, sitting down. Owain pulled a chair out, and the people at the table made room in a shuffle noise. Arthur shifted his seat, angling it so that he could keep an eye on Merlin.

"Come on, if Merlin were gay, we'd have heard about it by now," Leon said. It was an entirely plausible argument, but Arthur could easily come up with a handful of reasons why Merlin might not be so free with advertising his alternate preference. If he had an alternate preference. Not that he did.

Arthur waffled between _knowing_ that Merlin wasn't gay, and _wishing_ he were.

"Yeah? How?" Gwaine challenged.

"You would've come waltzing into the tent and announced, _that settles it, he's gay, and how do I know? Because I just got laid_ ," Perceval said. He searched the table. "Which one's my glass?"

"This one," Owain said, holding up an empty.

"No, I think it were this one," Perceval said, pointing to the fresh pint in Gareth's hand, the one he'd gotten from Merlin on his way back to the table. Gareth frowned, and cradled his mug close to his chest.

"Back off," Gareth growled.

A bemused Perceval leaned back in his seat and signalled a passing waitress. Arthur glanced back at Merlin and Will, seeing how they spoke with their foreheads nearly touching. Whatever they were talking about, it was serious, because neither one of them smiled. The conversation transitioned through a string of expressions: Will grimaced, Merlin winced, Will flinched, Merlin looked sad, Will mocked, Merlin challenged, and finally, Will gave in.

Arthur wasn't surprised. He imagined that people gave in to Merlin quite a lot.

Even him.

Arthur turned back to the table to catch Perceval's speculative expression, watching him with an eyebrow raised by a bare centimetre, a faint curl of amusement to his lips. Arthur broke contact embarrassingly quickly, and shoved the empties out of his way. He folded his arms on the table.

"You lot know that these two weeks come at a price?"

"I thought that the two weeks were because we won the war games," Owain said.

Arthur exchanged a glance with Leon. The two had spoken on the first leg of their trip, tucked toward the back of the plane, speaking quietly when most of the others were staring out the windows or trying to get a few winks of sleep despite the turbulence rippling under the wings. He told Leon what he could without giving him too much information, and Leon -- good, dependable Leon, who knew Arthur well enough to be able to hear what Arthur wasn't saying out loud -- hadn't needed any more than what Arthur had felt able to give.

Now it was the team's turn to be told. He'd meant to tell them before they left the base, then he meant to tell them on the plane, but it never seemed to be the right time, and this wasn't the right time, either, but it would have to do.

"You remember that debrief Merlin and I got called into?"

"The one you two are both so mum about, you can't even look him in the eye?" Perceval asked. The table fell silent when the waitress arrived, put down his pint, and cleared the table of empties. Arthur waited until she was out of earshot before nodding.

"That one, yeah."

"What was that about, then?" Gwaine asked.

Arthur studied the shooter for a few heartbeats, trying to decide if Gwaine already knew -- chances were high, considering how Major Kilgarrah's aide had loose lips where Gwaine was concerned. In the end, Arthur came up with "No, he maybe probably almost definitely didn't know" because the aide hadn't been present at the debriefing, The Dragon had his Very Serious expression at the time, and no notes had been taken.

"About us getting our two weeks cut short if something comes up," Arthur said, getting it out quick, like ripping a sticky plaster off to get it over with.

No one said anything right away; it was Owain who broke the silence. "Are. You. Taking. The. Piss?"

"Afraid not," Arthur said. He sipped his pint, not wanting to drink too much; the way most of the others were going at it, he was going to get stuck driving one of the drunken loads to London. "There's high-value targets that they want us to go after, soon as they figure out where they've disappeared to."

There was complaining, swearing, some grumbling, more drinking, a lot of groaning, and finally, a collective sigh of resignation.

"And the odds of that happening are...?" Gwaine asked.

"Are you gambling again?" Perceval asked.

"I haven't heard stakes yet."

Arthur chuckled humourlessly. "Anywhere from the minute we left debriefing to three months from now, depending on how badly Gwaine, Perce, Owain and Merlin spooked them."

The three of the four seated at the table exchanged glances, while the rest of them raised eyebrows. Gwaine leaned in, his voice pitched low. "So it has to do with the Americans?"

It was Leon who nodded.

Gwaine slid forward in his seat until he was perched on the edge and very nearly climbing over the table. "You found out what it was about?"

Arthur didn't answer right away. He glanced over his shoulder at Merlin and Will, suppressing a flinch at the proprietary way that Will's hand rested on Merlin's shoulder. When he turned his attention to the table, he took another sip of the bitters, but the ale only made the one rising up at the back of his throat even worse. He spotted Perceval's knowing smirk almost right away, and ignored it, offering the group a shrug. "Yeah, I did."

He didn't offer more information, and that was in part because he didn't have a lot of information to give them, in part because he was still chewing on what he did have. There had been a few things Wrong, capital W, about the debrief, which was full of missing holes and glossed-over information, and there was still the question about the Weird stuff, capital W, that Merlin and Perceval and Owain and Gwaine had seen. Most of the team picked up on his silence and left it alone, though, knowing full well that if Arthur had anything important to add, he would've done it already.

It was only a matter of time before Arthur had more information. He'd already made a few calls. His contacts would get back to him soon.

"So why you and Merlin at the debrief? Why not Leon? I mean, he's your second, right?" Gwaine was like a dog who wouldn't let go of a bone. Arthur swallowed a sigh.

"He is, and he still is," Arthur said firmly, nodding at Leon. "He's been read into what's going on, so he's aware, and don't you lot try to get it out of him if you can't get it out of me."

"Bah, I'll just ask Merlin," Perceval said, but the tone was light, and Arthur knew he wouldn't.

"But the debrief?"

Arthur exchanged a conversational look with Leon that repeated conversations they'd already had multiple times:

_"Do you want to, or should I?"_

_"No, go ahead. Privilege of rank and all that rot."_

_"Are you sure? I've done it so many times."_

_"If you insist."_

Leon got up with a sigh, stretched theatrically, and reached over the table to whack Gwaine upside the head.

"OW. What was that for?"

"Being nosy as fuck," Leon said.

"But the debrief!" Gwaine insisted. "Why Merlin and not you?"

"Gah!" Leon grunted, sitting back down. He threw up his hands, and gestured at Arthur with a _do you want to field this one, or should I hit harder?_ wave in Gwaine's direction.

"You know how the Brass is about security clearances," Arthur said.

"Security clearances? But Merlin's... OH!" Gwaine grinned. "You got upped."

Arthur leaned forward menacingly. "And that, I hope, is the last anyone will mention the debrief and security clearances."

Gwaine sat back in his seat, holding up his hands in a satisfied gesture, but it was Lance who pointed out, "It should be, until the next time."

"Nosy as fuck," Leon repeated, pointing in Gwaine's direction.

Arthur chuckled and finished off his pint -- he was still on his first, and the second had disappeared down someone else's gullet some time ago. He put it down and glanced around at his team. "I know on past R&R we've been lax about PT -- we did it whenever, if we did it at all. That's not going to fly this time around. I want everyone to stick to the routine. We'll meet at the usual for the runs, then PT afterward. If someone doesn't show up, we'll hunt you down and put you through it no matter what condition you're in -- your brains fucked out, hungover to an inch of your life, in a coma on emergency life support. No excuse is acceptable.

"You want to get fat and soft, do it on your own time. Just ask Gwaine, Perce, Owain or Merlin. The targets are _toffs_ , in a completely different class than what we're used to. Getting them, when we get called to get them, isn't going to be easy. I want everyone in top form."

There was a chorus of "Yes, sir!" around the table, and Arthur saw in satisfaction that most of the team eased up on their drinking.

"You've got one day's respite, and then we're back to the same old, yeah?"

Everyone nodded.

"Keep your phones on. Check that you have everyone else's numbers. No one's out of contact, not for a minute, all right?"

"What about Merlin?" Lance asked.

"I asked Morgana to make the usual arrangements for him. As soon as I get back to the flat, I'll text everyone his number."

The usual arrangements consisted of setting Merlin up with a cell phone, a gym membership, approvals and paperwork for the gun range, an expenses account if he needed one for clothes and equipment, and access to cars from the Pendragon Consulting fleet. Everyone got the same treatment whether or not they'd signed a contract with Pendragon -- the money came out of Arthur's own pocket, and the cars, well, what Uther didn't know...

"Besides, he'll be at yours, so if we need to find him, we'll just ring you, yeah?" Gwaine asked, wriggling his eyebrows suggestively.

Arthur sighed, and glanced at Leon again, but Perceval volunteered, "I'll do it," and smacked Gwaine on the back of his head, the blow nearly throwing Gwaine on top of the table.

Arthur laughed with the rest of them, but inwardly, he wasn't laughing at all. Merlin staying at the flat was an open-door invitation for all sorts of trouble -- trouble that Arthur was trying very hard to avoid. He had just about convinced himself that it was a sound idea from a logistical point of view -- with Merlin there, they could talk about the debrief and try to work out a sketchy plan of attack based on Merlin's experience against them -- but the instant Merlin rose from his seat and gave Arthur a view of his arse, all of Athur's upper brain functions went on holiday.

He glanced at Merlin again. At Merlin and Will. Whatever conversation they'd been having, they'd come to some sort of agreement, because Will's body language was grudging _all right, fine_ , while Merlin's was relieved _thanks, mate, I owe you one_. Arthur turned away when Merlin put a hand on Will's shoulder -- it was such an easy, casual gesture that Arthur _ached._

Why this inconsiderate, rude, disrespectful -- Arthur had absolutely not missed the way Will didn't greet the highest-ranking person in the group until the very last on purpose, or how Will glared at him as if Arthur Had Done Something Wrong Just By Existing -- complete and utter _lout_ merited Merlin's affection, and not any of the members of the team, not _Arthur_...

Arthur grit his teeth and started on his second ale.

"Make some room, yeah?" Merlin said, coming up behind Arthur, and Lance shifted everyone on his left over for two new spots. Merlin sat down next to Arthur, Will next to Merlin, and the waitress came by with a fresh round of drinks that everyone looked askance of, until Merlin said, "This one's mine."

Arthur smiled, but the smile faded when he saw Will's dark look over Merlin's shoulder. He sighed inwardly and said, "Nice one. Thanks."

And turned away.

There was a funny look on Merlin's face that he only just glimpsed as he turned to start a conversation with Leon, but before he could look back and figure out what it meant, Merlin had turned away, too, to talk to Will.

Will shot Arthur a triumphant, knowing smirk, and dragged Lance and Gwaine into a conversation about training at the Artists. Arthur listened with half an ear, but any time Will slipped into a story about Merlin, Merlin silenced Will with a threat of, "Oh, yeah? Well, I remember --" that turned into a shouting match with no clear winner but a definite, mutual agreement of silence.

Resigned, Arthur let himself be drawn into a conversation with Leon and the others. It wasn't until some time later that he realized that Merlin's warmth at his left side had faded and had been replaced with Will's cold chill.

He spotted Merlin over at the pool table with Perceval, Owain and Gwaine, the four of them split into two teams and tossing a coin for the break.

"I'll get the next round," Lance said, getting up.

"None for me," Arthur said. He'd barely cracked his second pint.

"Or me," Leon added, standing with Lance, "But I'll give you a hand."

Their abandonment left Arthur with Will. Will leaned forward with one arm on the table, the other looped over the back of his chair, making himself look bigger and menacing, and the man had the look for it, too. It just didn't work on Arthur. Not when he had Uther Pendragon for his father, not with Morgana as his sister. He made himself comfortable and waited for Will to get whatever it was off of his chest.

The silent staring match didn't last long. Will said, "You know, you're not much better than the last one."

"The last one?"

Will tilted his head in Merlin's direction. "His last Captain was a giant arse, too. Thought he was all that. He could shoot better, handle the tech better, run faster and higher and do more pushups and squat more weight than anyone else on the team. Fucking dumb as a stump he was, and about as useless."

"Is that right," Arthur said, his tone neutral. He took a small sip of his pint and waited to see if there would be more.

Will's brows pinched in the middle of his forehead when he realized Arthur wasn't rising to the bait. "He almost died. Merlin did. Because of him."

"He told us something about it, kept mum on most." Arthur waited. "What happened?"

"What do you think happened?" Will's voice was a rubber-band snap. "Half the team got wiped out, Merlin nearly with them. If I hadn't convinced my C.O. to detour when I heard Merlin's unit got hit..."

Will trailed off and let Arthur fill the silence for himself. He reached for a drink, but his own glass was empty. He finished Merlin's instead.

"How long have you known him?" Arthur asked.

"Ages."

Arthur waited for more, but Will wasn't volunteering. "What happened to his Captain?"

"As if you don't know. You spoilt bastards stick together, yeah? Suck off the same golden tit, don't you? Make a habit of riding on grunt coattails all the way to the next shiny medal and plush commission?" Will barked a short laugh that was more of a grimace than anything else. He leaned in and said, "He got up on charges. Tribunal and everything. Dragged Merlin in on it because he couldn't pass blame to his second -- the poor bastard got blown up. But Merlin? He was next up the line, and he was the comm-spec."

A darkening clouded Will's expression, venomous and hostile, directed aimlessly in every direction until it landed on Arthur.

"Merlin didn't pass on orders. Merlin didn't transmit coordinates. Merlin didn't call in assistance. Merlin gave the enemy their position." Will leaned in so close that Arthur got a whiff of sweat and cologne and gun oil. "That's what the Captain said. Loud and often and in open court and in front of the family of the rest of the squad that died and in front of the squad that lived.

"Shite rolls downhill, don't it? Rolled right on top of Merlin. He was in a hospital bed at the time. In a coma. They'd just dug out a bullet that done broke into fragments. A piece was this close to his heart," Will said, holding out his forefinger and thumb a few millimetres apart. "Tore some of his lung. Lost so much blood, the white coats weren't even sure if he'd come out of it. And when he did, what do they go and do? Drag him in front of the tribunal to answer his Captain's charges."

Will paused long enough to glance over at where Merlin was playing pool with the others, in laughing argument with Owain.

"What do you think that did to Merlin? Waking up to find out that the man who was supposed to have his squad's back turned right round and put the blame on him? Or finding out that his Captain, who cocked it all up, got off the hook with a slap on the wrist because no one was conscious enough to tell the judges what really happened? Or worse, having to stand up in court pale and looking as if someone just shat on his grave, and defend himself? It was his word against Captain Fancypants', and whose do you think they wanted to believe? I mean, fuck, they couldn't change their minds now, could they, not when they were on record saying that it wasn't the Captain's fault, yeah?

"What did Merlin have? Couldn't check the evidence, because his Box was blown to bits, and the only one who had a rat's chance in hell of rebuilding it was Merlin, and do you think they let him? What about the rest of his squad? The ones who made it? Half of them couldn't remember their names, the other half weren't close enough to see anything."

A cold heat ran down Arthur's spine. It was outrage at the way things got bollocksed up, mixed with disbelief -- _Merlin?_ They thought that Merlin would've failed his squad? No, not _his_ Merlin, not the Merlin who couldn't keep his poker face straight, who didn't have the least bit of guile in him. And especially not Merlin, who looked at Arthur with such absolute trust that Arthur was privately terrified that he'd ever fail him.

He could picture it as vividly as Will described it -- Merlin waking up from his coma, in terrible pain, and learning that the man he'd followed, the Captain who should have done the right thing, had betrayed him and put all the fault on him.

It made Arthur's innards clench tight with vengeance and protectiveness and a promise that he'd never do that to Merlin, because he couldn't, he wouldn't --

"-- lucky break," Will was saying. "His advocate got her hands on paperwork that confirmed everything Merlin said that hadn't even made evidence against his old C.O. Bunch of anonymous data, it was, but enough for prove beyond a doubt. They threw the case out. Merlin got free and clear."

_Unbelievable. Unbelievable. Unbelievable._

If Merlin had been _his_ , this load of crock would never have happened. Arthur wouldn't have let it. As it was, he couldn't help but feel undeniable rage toward the son-of-a-bitch who'd taken Merlin's trust and ground it under his heel, and complete and utter disbelief that Merlin would still be willing to trust someone else.

To trust _him_.

Arthur looked up and found Will studying him, still with those hard eyes, with the brash, rude bravado, measuring and weighing.

"What was the Captain's name?"

"What's it to you?" Will asked, his eyes narrowing.

"What's it to me?" Arthur raised a brow and tilted his head toward the table, "This is my team. When we go out, we go out together. We're at risk, all of us, and it's my job to make sure their risk is as small as possible. And I can do that by keeping my team the hell away from pillocks like your Captain Fancypants. I want to know his name."

Will didn't answer right away. He leaned back and nodded to himself. "Cedric Walsh."

Arthur nodded and committed the name to memory.

Will leaned in again, his voice an octave lower and trembling with threat. "Don't think this makes us friends. We're not. Not by a long shot. But I'm going to tell you one thing. I catch wind of you hurting Merlin, I don't give a toss what happens to me because all that matters is, _you're_ not going to see me coming, mate."

Arthur stared at him. Will stared back.

"Fine by me," Arthur said finally.

It was Will who broke eye contact first, and Arthur a moment later, glancing down the table where some of the men were talking animatedly. He saw Kay sketching on a paper placemat. "Pass me that pen," Arthur ordered.

He jotted a phone number on a cocktail napkin and gave it to Will, who stared at it as if it was infested with the bubonic plague. Arthur shoved it in his front pocket, and reached for a second napkin, pushing the pen in Will's hand.

"My number. Now give me yours. Something's off with Merlin, you'll hear it directly from me."

Will shot him a sharp, measuring look that lasted ages, and finally nodded, writing down his number. Arthur took the napkin, tossed the pen at Kay, and turned back to look at Will.

"Are you done pissing on my shoe?"

Will blinked and coughed back a startled laugh, masking it behind one of the drinks that Leon and Lance were passing around, taking a deep draught before putting it down. He got up, and shook his head. "No, mate."

He stood up and walked away, weaving around the crowd to join Merlin and the others at the pool table. He clapped Merlin's back and made him miss a shot, and the two of them had an in-each-other's-face shouting match full of chest-bumping that ended with Gwaine putting himself bravely in front of Will, and Perceval tossing Merlin over his shoulder to carry him to a safe corner. Arthur shook his head and turned to Leon and Lance.

It was another hour before the men started to trickle out, grouped in bunches of whoever was going whichever way, one sober man behind the wheel until they were nearly all gone and the only ones who were left were Leon and Merlin and Arthur.

And Will.

Sam -- his ride back north -- whistled loud and gestured at Will to get moving or to lose his ride, and Merlin walked Will out. Arthur tried very hard not to watch the way they exchanged quiet words, traded another hug, and parted ways. He tried very hard not to notice the way Merlin's shoulders slumped down, how his smile faded, how he nearly tripped over his own pouting lip now that his "best mate" was gone. And, most importantly, he wholly and completely ignored the way Merlin's leg brushed against his when he plopped in the seat beside Arthur.

"Seemed like a nice bloke," Arthur said, drinking the last of his ice water and rattling the ice cubes around and around.

Merlin gave him a doubting sidelong look. "Will? Nice? You're having me on. I saw him snarling at you earlier."

Arthur shrugged. "Well, he was snarling nicely."

Merlin smiled, and there was a small, soft apology in it with just enough sweetness to make Arthur want to kiss it away. "Sorry about him. He's always been rough around the edges."

"He said he's known you ages," Arthur said.

"Yeah. Ages. He's like the brother I never had," Merlin said. "Put up with me in school, got me my first beer, saved me from drowning in the loo after I drank too much in uni. Don't think I would've survived boot camp without him."

_Brother._

That was infinitely better than "Best Mates". The gnarled mass in Arthur's belly unravelled like a sailor's slipknot, and all the tension between his shoulders eased. He'd never been so inexplicably relieved.

"All right, I've settled the tab," Leon said, coming back to the table. "Arthur, you mind driving back? I'd like to catch a few winks on the way before Morgana pounces me the minute I open the door."

"No, stop. Quit talking. Too much information. I do not want to picture Morgana and you," Arthur said, taking the keys.

 

  


**ooOOoo**  


 

Merlin woke up to daylight.

He blinked without seeing what he was looking at, his brain rebooting in the meantime, and when his operating system finally kicked in, he groaned and stretched under the warm down comforter, turning onto his side to nuzzle the pillow that was soft on his cheek, and squirming deeper onto a luxurious mattress that was packed at least a foot deep with plush. It was a nice contrast to the thin military cot, the scratchy blankets and the cardboard pillow that was the army's definition of a "bed".

The rest of his senses kicked in, and he heard the reason why he woke up in the first place. _Mum._ Merlin scrambled out of the bed, slapping the alarm clock on his way out, glancing at the glowing red numbers only long enough to figure out that if he didn't go now, he'd be late. He skipped the shower and any attempt to do something with his hair, and instead brushed his teeth with one hand and pulled his clothes out of his bag with the other. He pulled on a pair of jeans and a clean T-shirt -- he didn't have much by way of civvies, and the rest of it was out at Uncle Gaius' place -- and dashed out of the bedroom.

Arthur's guest room.

Merlin's brain was still processing that reminder.

They'd arrived sometime in the early hours of the morning after dropping Leon off at a lovely two-tiered house that was a block away, Merlin half-dozing his way up the steps to Arthur's place, too unconscious to fully appreciate the posh building that was Arthur's "flat" -- "flat", nothing, it was a miniature mansion in comparison to his Mum's house up in Wales and his Uncle's out in London's west end. He'd barely glanced at the spare bedroom or the attached bath when he woke up, scarcely noticed the long hallway or the open living room and the large kitchen on the opposite end, and he was well on his way to the stairs that led to the first floor -- and the front door -- of the house when he was lured to a stop by the smell of the most absolutely delicious nectar in the universe.

Coffee.

Merlin doubled back.

A _Venti_ -sized Starbucks cup was all by its lonesome on the kitchen island. Merlin went to keep it company, pulling his hand back with a startled yelp at the sudden buzz of a blender whirring. Arthur was a bit deeper in the kitchen, his broad back to Merlin, a white Tee stretched invitingly over delicious shoulders. He wore black shorts that came to just over his knees, and Merlin realized then that the damp of Arthur's hair and the sweat marks on his shirt were because he'd gone for a run.

He'd seen a sweaty Arthur in tight Tees before, but somehow, seeing him like this in a domestic setting made him look all the more gorgeous.

And it didn't help the early morning too-snug fit of his jeans that had already been too snug to begin with.

Arthur poured thick protein shake slop into a tall glass and turned around, pausing when he saw Merlin. "I thought I'd have to drag you out of bed. I've been listening to your alarm for ten minutes."

"It's your own fault," Merlin said, pointing askance at the coffee.

"That's yours. I keep my promises," Arthur said, and Merlin frowned for a minute before he recalled the bargain they made in the chopper right before the war game against Valiant's team -- free coffee, courtesy of Arthur Pendragon, for every day that they were on R&R, provided Merlin would help them win against their cheating rivals.

"Nice one. Thanks." Merlin grinned, ridiculously pleased that Arthur would remember, and raised the cup in thanks. He still thought that it was a bad idea to be staying over at Arthur's place -- the sweaty, slightly-out-of-breath, lazy-limbed and languid way he was posing his running gear definitely didn't improve things -- but the coffee was a definite perk.

"How is it my fault that you're about to miss your mum?" Arthur asked.

"The bed in the guest room is a little bit too comfortable. How are you ever going to get rid of people?"

"Maybe I don't want to," Arthur said, and there was a roughness in his voice that Merlin chalked up to the protein shake he was drinking. Arthur turned away, took a box from the counter, and put it in front of Merlin. "This is yours, too."

It was a small smartphone, one of the newer models, and for a second, Merlin was torn between fondling the coffee and playing with this sudden, new toy.

"Already activated, and I programmed in everyone's numbers. Keep it on you."

The phone was, predictably, encased in bright Pendragon red. Merlin thumbed through the settings to see that it had a full ride of every bell and whistle possible. He was startled out of it when Arthur snapped his fingers in front of his face.

"You'll be late. Your mum?"

"Oh, fuck!" Merlin shoved the phone in his pocket and grabbed the coffee. He was almost at the top of the stairs when Arthur called him back.

"Wait."

A faint rattle and flash of light in the air caught Merlin's attention, and he caught a set of house keys. "Your security code's the last six of your ID. Give my regards to your mum. Tell her thanks for the biscuits she sent."

"You mean, the whole roll of biscuits you ate? No wonder you went running this morning. Must have been feeling the extra pounds."

"Oi, are you calling me fat?"

Merlin grinned and waved. He left the house at a run, glancing back only because he wanted to remember where he was staying and what it looked like, and found the entrance to the Underground two blocks away. It was midmorning on a workweek and the crowds were at the bare minimum, with the train nearly on the empty side when he hopped the platform and skid into the car right before the doors closed.

He pulled the cell phone out of his pocket and couldn't help the grin that spread across his face. The others had phones, too, he knew, but getting one of his own made him feel as if, maybe, he belonged to the team. And since he couldn't help it, he took the phone apart. There wasn't much that he could do without his tools, but he increased the bandwidth and the reception, and it was good enough to get a better signal when going through the tunnels on a moving train. Merlin added a few more names and numbers to the contacts list, and texted Will.

_New nmbr when Im on Island. Also, u were harsh 2 Arthur._

Merlin switched trains by the time he received a response from Will.

_Man acts like hes got a golden cock. Deserved it._

Merlin rolled his eyes. His thumbs dashed over the screen keyboard. _Thanks 4 coming. Made my day. Think u can come out again?_

_Will try. GTG. Kids. Guns. Barns._

Merlin stepped out of the train and headed up the streets. It was a twenty minute walk to Uncle Gaius' place, and he was assaulted with ten different delicious smells when he stepped -- cinnamon, ham, beans, eggs -- all the ingredients for a full menu fry-up. "Mum! You're supposed to be getting ready to go, not cook me breakfast!"

"Oh!" Hunith came out of the kitchen in a rush of fabric and dishtowels, wrapping her arms around Merlin. "Merlin!"

"Mum!" They broke apart and grinned.

"They haven't been feeding you," Hunith scolded, looking Merlin up and down with disapproval.

"You know what army food is like," Merlin said. He grinned and embraced Gaius when the man joined them in the living room. "Did you eat?"

"I did --"

"-- good, is the car loaded?"

"It is --"

"-- we'll miss your flight if we don't go now --"

"-- I won't miss my flight --"

"-- you'll _definitely_ lose your seat to Meredith," Merlin pointed out.

Hunith's protests died with the reminder, and she was instantly transformed into a battalion commander, ordering them about. "Gaius! Where are the keys? Give them to Merlin! Hand me my bag, Merlin! Gaius! Make sure that you keep all the food warm and that Merlin eats when he gets back!"

It was a flurry of activity, hasty good-byes, and a quick double-time march to the car, an old beater of a formerly-classic car that Gaius had modified to run on a homemade electrical source, and God Forbid anyone ever find out, because it was probably very illegal and unapproved for the road.

They talked -- mostly, Hunith talked -- along the way, with Merlin answering questions when Hunith asked, but it wasn't until they were at the airport, in the parking lot unloading the luggage, before she put her hand on his arm and held him back with a too-familiar look, and asked, "Have you been careful?"

"Yes'm."

Hunith raised a brow -- it wasn't quite as menacing as Gaius' Famous Raised Brow of Disapproval, but when it was coupled with Mum's Warning Glare, it was very effective -- and asked, "I mean, have you been _very_ careful?"

"Really careful, Mum. I promise."

"No magic?" Hunith asked, her voice low. They were alone in the parking lot and all anyone could hear clearly was the sound of planes overhead and the roar of cars driving past on the expressway, but she glanced around them anyway to make sure that they wouldn't be overheard.

"Um." Merlin hauled the largest of the two suitcases out of the boot, and ducked his head in to make sure that he hadn't knocked out the tubes and wires that fuelled the engine. "Yes'm."

Hunith's hand on his arm was a death grip of warning, and she turned him around to meet her eyes. Merlin felt his cheeks flushing almost immediately, even before he could come up with a decent lie to throw her off the scent. He couldn't lie -- not to his Mum, not to Uncle Gaius, and the people who knew him well, like Will, knew when he was trying to lie. He was pretty sure that genetics were involved in it, because his Mum couldn't lie to him, either.

"A little bit," he admitted.

"Oh, Merlin." He flinched under the weight of her disappointment.

"It's not like I can help it, Mum. It comes out on its own when my team is in danger. You know what it's like." That was mostly the truth, and Hunith's fingers in his arm tightened. "Ow. Let go, Mum. You have like a death grip. I'm sorry, all right? I have to use it. I know I promised I wouldn't, but it's not easy. I mean, I know I can help them, and I don't want anyone to die, not after... Not after..."

He heard his own voice break.

Hunith's hand around his arm loosened and she pulled him in a tight hug. "I know, Merlin. I know. I'm just worried about you. I want you to be safe. And if it means using..."

A car drove by, and her protective instincts kicked in, because her lips clamped shut and she gave Merlin a _you know what I mean, and you know why I'm worried, and please don't do anything foolish like getting caught_ look that he'd seen a million times before. He did the only thing he could to reassure her and held her tight.

A few more cars drove past. Hunith patted Merlin's sides and he let her go. "I don't want to be late for check-in," she said, which was code for, _If I hug you any more, I'm never going to let you go._

He gave her a kiss on the cheek, and she patted his arm, her expression wavering between Worried Mother and Proud Mum.

He waited with her in line, helped with the luggage, walked her to the gate to the security check-in, and gave her another tight hug and a "Have a great trip and call me, I gave you my new number, yeah? Don't let Meredith get on your last nerve" good-bye before waving her off.

They were used to this -- the quick visits, the hasty good-byes, the Best Laid Plans cast aside. The Army was in the family blood -- Hunith had been a nurse, which was how she'd met Balinor in the first place, and Uncle Gaius had been in the Engineers for a stint. It only made sense to Merlin to have joined up and to stick it out as long as he did, but Merlin knew that they were both counting down the days until he finished his tour.

The lunch hour rush lengthened the drive back to Gaius' place, and he used the house keys to unlock the heavy front door, and went inside without knocking. When Hunith had been on tour, this house, with Uncle Gaius and all his oddities, had been home. "I'm back!"

"Workshop!"

Merlin was halfway through the house on his way to the addition that sprawled over most of the tiny backyard when Gaius shouted, "Get some breakfast!"

His stomach rumbled in protesting agreement. "Do you want some?" he shouted back.

"Please!"

Merlin entered the narrow kitchen and shook his head. Every available surface was covered with pastries and dishes, the dining table overflowed with packages with cakes and biscuits, and the sink was an ocean of suds with a mountainous range attempting to break Everest's height record. He found a couple of plates in the cabinet, loaded both with his Mum's egg cakes and sausages and slabs of freshly-baked bread, and headed toward the back.

"Mind your step," Gaius warned, looking up. Distracted by the grotesque sight of Gaius' eyes magnified by the lenses clipped to his glasses, Merlin nearly tripped over one of the robots.

The robot clubbed Merlin's foot and chirruped.

"Sorry!"

The robot -- with a long oblong body, an eye that was a camera lenses, and spidery legs -- beeped at him before clanking away.

"Did you program this one to be ornery?"

"You almost stepped on him, what did you expect?"

"At least he's nicer than the other one. You know, the one that tried to cut off my leg? Where's that one?" Merlin looked around warily.

"He tried to cut off _my_ leg," Gaius said, pointing toward a shelf overflowing with disassembled parts. Merlin thought he recognized the rogue robot under the pile.

"Better the leg than other important parts, I suppose," Merlin said, and held up the food. "Where do you want this?"

Gaius removed the eyeglass clips and cleared a space. "After your mother finished in my kitchen, I'm surprised that there were any plates left."

"They were tucked under the big ugly platter that we used last Beltane. You remember, the one Alice brought those sweet tarts on? She said she never wanted to see it again?" Alice was Gaius' on-again, off-again partner -- Merlin couldn't exactly call her his girlfriend -- and she was somewhere off in Europe for the next six months on a retreat.

"Ah, yes. I thought Allard destroyed that thing when he sat on it."

"I'm convinced that it's cursed. It keeps turning up like a bad penny. And in one piece, no matter how many bits you leave it in."

Gaius chuckled. After a few bites, he gestured with his fork in the general direction of the kitchen. "I don't suppose you are interested in taking all that food back for your team? You are staying with your captain, are you not?"

"I am," Merlin mumbled around a too-big bite of the egg cake. "And I could. You don't want to keep any of it for yourself?"

"Dear boy, where would I put it? I'll keep some of the raspberry scones, but the rest of it had best be gone before I regain the thirty pounds I put on at your mother's last visit." Gaius patted his belly.

Merlin half-laughed and thumbed over his shoulder. "Did you see how much there was? The toffs that hang out on the train will gut me for them. I need a box truck just to get it back to Arthur's."

"I'll drop you off if you do the dishes and help me with that," Gaius said, pointing to his latest creation. It was a tiny bug, shaped like a beetle, its fragile web-wings stretched and iridescent in the light.

"What's wrong with it?"

"The transmitter. As soon as it drops out of range of the remote control, it powers down and drops like a pebble."

Merlin leaned over to look at it. "Still making toys, Gaius?"

"Better than weapons, I should think," Gaius said, his eyebrow coming to half-mast. "It's not all that I'm working on, however."

He used his fork to point in another corner of his cluttered workroom. There was a partially-finished skeleton of what looked to be a dragon-shaped construct, its wings unfurled. "I haven't made much progress. I was trying to solve the transmission problem with the beetle, since that directly reflects on it."

Merlin put his plate down and approached the little dragon, absolutely enthralled. "Then, I'd better get to work, shouldn't I?"

"That you should, my boy," Gaius said.

That was the last that Merlin consciously remembered of any conversation -- or of eating anything else -- until Gaius put a heavy hand on his shoulder and pulled him away from the workbench, beetle still in hand. He glanced at the beetle with a bushy white brow raised nearly to his hairline, and said, "I asked for help in fixing the transmitter, not to redesign the beetle itself. What have you done?"

"Oh, um. Given it a bit more independence, I suppose. More range, like you wanted, but now it'll act more like a beetle on its own, like it's supposed to, yeah? Isn't that what you want to do with the dragon?"

Gaius raised the other brow and adjusted his glasses. "Certainly, although I will be merely guessing on the proper behaviour of a dragon, of course."

Gaius took the beetle and put it on the workbench, giving Merlin a frown. There was a damp dishtowel in his hand, and soap suds on the back of his wrists. Merlin flinched when he realized that Gaius must have gone to do the dishes that he'd promised to take care of. "You've been at it for hours. Now, tell me. What's on your mind?"

Merlin sat back a bit on the stool, his hands on his legs, and sighed.

"Is it the team?" Gaius ventured, dragging a stool closer so that he could lean against it.

"Oh, no, it's not the team. They're brilliant." At Gaius' doubtful look, Merlin held up his hands. "No, really. They are."

"What, then?"

Merlin crossed his arms over his chest. He stared at a dark scorch mark on the floor, where he'd dropped a burning solder as a child. It would've been easy to buff it out, stain the wood again, and forget that little incident, but Gaius wouldn't let him. It was a floor, Gaius would say, over and over again. There were more important things to fix.

Like beetles. And dragons.

"We had a mission," Merlin said, finally. "There were sorcerers."

Gaius' frown deepened. "Tell me."

Merlin licked dry lips. He took a deep breath, held it, and the words came out in a rush. "It were the four of us. Gwaine, Perce, Owain and me. A strict shoot mission, take out the target sort of thing. Not my show at all, I was only there for the ride.

"Except a dust storm comes out at us out of nowhere, the bullets won't go through the magic shields, and two sorcerers break off from the main group and come after us. They've got magic grenades and can toss me about like I'm a wadded-up tissue full of snot."

Gaius heaved a heavy breath and put his hands on his thighs, his expression changing to one of grave concern. "And what did you do?"

"What could I do? Brought down an abandoned building on them and they still walked away from it as if I hadn't done naught. I'm bollocks at this, Uncle Gaius. We're just lucky Arthur came looking for us, is all."

"Very lucky," Gaius said after a long silence. He got to his feet. "Well, it's unlikely that you'll encounter them again."

Merlin stared at the scorch mark on the floor and didn't answer.

"Merlin?" Gaius put a hand on his shoulder.

"We weren't supposed to survive. But we did, and now they're so happy with us that they're going to call us up for round two," Merlin said, his voice a whisper. "It's my fault."

Gaius' squeezed comfortingly. "I hardly think so. You saved your team. That's what matters in the end."

"Not if we get pitted against them again. What do I do then, Gaius? I'm not good at this. I've been not using my magic most of my life. And never mind that, how do I use it without other people catching me?" Merlin hated this -- this irrational fear of getting caught, which wasn't so irrational after all. He hated not knowing what to do, how to do it, when to do it. He'd spent his life hiding what he was, using magic in secret, and now the only thing that could save him was if he went out and used it.

Gaius patted him a few times, and moved away. "You do what you can, Merlin, but don't sell yourself short. Your power is considerable, if unpractised. What about the spells we worked on together?"

"Oh, they've been useful, believe me," Merlin said, still holding himself tight. "I can track my team, I can shield from bullets and explosions, and I can, uh, maybe knock grenades out of the way but that was a fluke. The other spells don't really help. I mean, making my Box indestructible is going to be useful if I ever get caught in a bomb blast again, and the invisible stuff came in handy a few times..."

"You haven't been practicing, then?"

"When? Where? The Army's not exactly a private place. Never mind that -- Mum would kill me if she knew."

"Your mother worries about you," Gaius said. "As I do. But if you will encounter them again, I'm sure she would rather you defend yourself however that you could."

Merlin's shoulders fell, and he sighed. "I can't exactly practice without my books. How am I supposed to carry them around without people asking questions?"

Gaius half-snorted. "You did declare Paganism as your religion, did you not?"

Merlin sighed heavily and stared heavenward for a brief moment. It was one reason why he didn't let anyone look too closely at his ID discs, half-worried about the raised eyebrows that would cause and all the questions it would raise. "I did, yeah."

"Then having books that relate to your faith shouldn't be a cause for concern."

Merlin uncrossed his arms long enough to rub his face in frustration. "I'm trying to do the opposite of attracting attention here, Uncle Gaius. Carrying around a couple of books that are old enough to be in a museum isn't going to help."

"That's not what I meant," Gaius said. After a moment, he slid from his stool and walked around the room. "Surely some of the other members of your team are known to break away for some private time to observe their traditions?"

Merlin shook his head. He was remotely aware that Galahad went to the interministry faith services, but he hadn't paid much attention otherwise. Religion wasn't something that the members of the team talked about, and if anyone else was observant, they were keeping it quiet. "Sure. Yeah. I suppose."

"Then you should take advantage of that," Gaius suggested. "And, of course, you can always practice here while you're on R&R."

Merlin grumbled and crossed his arms again. On the one hand, he didn't want to go out in the field without some heavier ammunition against the sorcerers, in case they encountered the same ones again. On the other, he had no idea how he would hide doing the really big spells, even if Gaius' suggestion worked.

He was only dimly aware of Gaius doing something behind his workbench. "Uncle Gaius? Do you remember telling me about the Sidhe?"

Gaius rose slightly, looking over his shoulder. "The Sidhe?"

"Yeah. It's that. You know. After the thing. With the sorcerers. There was a debrief, and." Merlin watched Gaius slowly stand up , his shoulders tensing with the same sort of patience he tried to maintain around Hunith when Hunith took over his home, and stumbled quickly to the end. "They're with the people who are behind the last mission. Our next missions too."

Gaius turned around, put his hands on the workbench, and leaned forward. "Did they see you? Do they know that you are magic?"

Merlin startled. "No. No, I don't think so. At least, I'm pretty sure neither one of them even noticed me."

"Good." Gaius nodded, relaxing. He paused. "And how did you notice them?"

"They weren't being exactly subtle," Merlin said, thinking about Aulfric and Sophia. Aulfric had a particularly strong, vibrating aura that was made all the worse when he looked at someone, pinning a wordless Merlin to his seat until Arthur shifted and put himself between them, breaking eye contact. Sophia was full of lackwit charm -- the kind often seen in Hollywood movies featuring a blonde starlet without much going on up in their heads -- that had thankfully been dialled down so that the menfolk could concentrate. Both of them had felt slippery, damp, and watery, and not in a pleasantly calm mountain-lake sort of way, but an angry-wind choppy-water accident-waiting-to-happen sort of way.

They made Merlin nervous.

"I see," Gaius said. He went back to rummaging in his cabinet.

"They're with the Americans," Merlin said, frowning.

"If they're with anyone, Merlin, I sincerely doubt that they are _with_ them. The Sidhe do what they do for their own purposes. And, most of the time, I doubt that they are even aware of their own nefarious goals."

"So why are they --"

"That, Merlin, I do not know," Gaius said. He paused what he was doing and half-turned around, looking thoughtful. "Although, I admit it's very curious. The Sidhe usually don't leave their domain. For them to be associated with the Americans, and in a foreign country... It is curious."

"Where did you put my books? Maybe there's something about the Sidhe in them?" Merlin asked, getting up.

"In a safe place. Ah, here it is," Gaius said, finding a thin, square object in a drawer. He handed it to Merlin.

"An e-reader? And it's not even my birthday," Merlin said, taking it with a cheeky grin. The e-reader was a paperback-sized full-colour touchscreen with silver edges and backing. He turned it on and found a list of the usual classics and nothing interesting. "Thanks, Uncle Gaius."

"You can add those journal papers you are always fascinated with. Some of your favourite textbooks. And, if you use your magic to unlock it, you'll find..."

Merlin tried it as Gaius was talking, using the tiniest curl of magic to activate the palm-sized tablet, and grinned when he saw the listing change completely. "The books!"

He recognized the cover of the spellbook he'd studied all through childhood, where _studying all through childhood_ was an euphemism for _one hour of pretending to play the piano each evening before running off to do something more fun with Will_ , but also several other reference tomes that Gaius kept on his bedroom shelf.

"How did you --"

"An archivist friend and a large enough flatbed scanner," Gaius said with a soft smile. "Now come. Help me with the mess your mother left me."

 

  


**ooOOoo**  


 

Every time they came home on R&R, Arthur had trouble sleeping. The constant drone outside the barracks was replaced with background city noise. The silence in his bedroom was too loud when he was used to listening to fifteen other men breathing, snuffling, snoring. He couldn't help laying awake in a too-soft bed that felt nothing like a hard military cot, preparing for whatever would wait them when they got back.

A swirl of wild, random thoughts were going through his head, and all of them raced in chaotic directions without settling down long enough for him to grab sleep by the horns and wrangle it into submission. He'd tried, though, and finally got up after a few hours. It was early enough to qualify as morning.

Arthur went running.

While he ran, he organized every stray strand of thinking into a nice, orderly list. For the first few kilometres, every detail went in vicious circles, and it took a couple more kilometres before Arthur was able to excise emotion from fact and think straight again.

One, the high-value targets that the Americans couldn't achieve was now their target, because the American specialists refused additional missions until there was better intel -- intel that they could use to actually capture or eliminate the targets. The CIA agents were desperate, so much so that they resorted to allied teams to do the job -- most likely using a bit of sleight of hand and subterfuge to convince other governments to lend assistance. No surprise there.

Two, the high-value targets were difficult to capture or eliminate not because of superior numbers or manpower or foreknowledge on the target's part. A special forces team was still a special forces team no matter where they were from, and they should have been able to overcome whatever roadblock was in their way. And yet, there was something different about Arthur's men that allowed them to prevail where the Americans had failed. He would need to take advantage of that, whatever it was.

Three, there was the larger concern was of the unexplained weirdness that his men had reported to him, unofficially, off the record, following their mission. The Americans had explained it away as advanced weapons technology from a foreign nation and hinted that some of that weaponry originated from the original high-value target, Mordred ap Aneurin.

Did Arthur believe it?

He wasn't sure. He saw for himself the new advancements that were coming out of Pendragon Consulting R&D -- the invisibility cloak prototype that Valiant had stolen to help his team cheat at the war games, for one. Protective shielding, either in the form of a new skin for transportation, or even in the form of high-energy generated radiation inches away from the actual body -- that wasn't unheard of. Arthur knew of several independent companies working on similar technology. Even university research departments were getting in the science fiction game by teleporting photons from one end of the room to another, something most people lauded as a large step toward teleporting inanimate objects, and, in the future, living organic matter.

And the glowing blue grenades? Most likely it was similar to the plasma charges that were under development at Pendragon, though the design didn't quite sound to be the same. The fact remained was, they existed.

On the other hand, the Americans hadn't explained away -- hadn't even tried to explain -- the dust storm that kicked up directly over the region that his men had gone into. It had been stagnant, immobile, and blew itself out within moments of the enemy convoy moving into a less vulnerable position. They hadn't explained away how Merlin had been picked up and tossed into a wall, or how Perceval had been tripped by thin air.

Four. Daly, and his computer tech, Baker, were the standard run-of-the-mill CIA agent and analyst combination. Daly was the mouthpiece; Baker knew what port to connect his computer to and what buttons to push. But the other two? Aulfric and the woman, Sophia? Aulfric acted as if he was the second agent in charge, or the man in charge, depending on the situation, his body language as telling as a badge. Sophia? She might have been relegated to the role of an analyst, but she barely touched her computer, dangerously volunteered information, and spent most of the debrief flirting with Arthur. Their behaviour didn't fit their roles. They knew more than they let on.

Five. Jonathan Aredian. The Jester. Mordred ap Aneurin. Surely the Americans guessed that the British Army wouldn't agree to dispatching members of one of the top SAS teams for fringe rebels, so these people were, at the very least, middle-management. There were people at the top of the pyramid that either the Americans were holding in reserve, or had chosen not to mention, and these people could be a problem.

Six. Arthur made it his business to know what it was that his rank and clearance allowed him, and he knew full well that rebel middle-management was well within the purview of his _original_ clearance. He hadn't needed the new clearance to hear what the Americans had to say, and there was no reason why Leon couldn't have been involved at the debriefing. So what was it, exactly, that he needed the upgraded security clearance for?

It all boiled down to number seven on Arthur's list. He had all these details, but they were scattered puzzle pieces with no pattern on them, and no picture to go by. He needed that picture.

Arthur passed by a Starbucks on his way home, doubling back to pick up a cup for Merlin -- he wasn't sure what the other man liked, but a straight brewed coffee seemed like a good bet. He left the coffee on the island in the kitchen and went to his bathroom to towel off, thinking that the smell of coffee would lure Merlin out of bed. But when there was no sign of him, and a quick glance at the clock hinted that he'd be late in getting his mother to the airport, Arthur went to check on Merlin.

He knocked on the door. He knocked again. Perfectly aware that all of his team were prone to oversleeping when on R&R, Arthur saved his knuckles and opened the door.

The early morning light, filtered through the clouds, softened the otherwise harsh lines of the stark-white walls and solid black furniture, and the blue-grey down comforter was a rumpled mass on top of four large pillows and something he hoped was a breathing body.

"Mer--"

Merlin shifted under the blankets, flopping over onto his belly.

A long bare leg, moon-milky against the blue-grey comforter, stretched out and curled slightly. The fine black hairs on his calf and thigh only served to enhance the lines of muscles, lean and lined even at rest. Arthur's eyes traced the length of his leg, his breath catching in his throat at the sight of Merlin's boxers, the fabric pushed up all the way to the crook and curve of his arse.

_Oh, fuck._

He couldn't tear his eyes away.

Arthur's running shorts were suddenly too tight, his cock pushing against the elastic waistband. He reached down to adjust himself, to loosen the knot on the ties, but his hand drifted instead to hold onto his hard length through the fabric.

What he wouldn't give to crawl between those legs, to run his hands up the curve of that smooth back, to kiss his way down again, to tug snug boxers from those narrow hips.

His hand stroked his cock. Once, twice.

The alarm clock on the side of the bed went off, loud, sharp, chirrupy -- and Arthur bolted from the doorway, shutting the door as quietly as he could, getting the hell out of there before he was caught, feeling as if he was fucking thirteen years old with a skin mag in his hand, desperate to hide it before he was caught. He groaned, adjusting himself again, trying to think of something else, anything else, because the image of Merlin's perfect arse presented to him was burned in the back of his eyelids, impossible to shake.

His solution was to think about Morgana jumping Leon.

He shuddered.

Arthur swore under his breath, heading into the kitchen, opening the cabinets that Morgana had stocked full of food for the party and rummaging around until he found the container of whey protein powder he'd specifically requested when he'd emailed her the shopping list. He tore open the seal with too much force, the container nearly slipping out of his hands and crashing on the floor.

_Fuck. Shite._

He leaned against the granite kitchen counter, his head down, and forced himself to breathe.

It had been ages since anyone provoked such an intense reaction, such a deep, unyielding _desire_ in Arthur.

He shook his head. No, that wasn't true. He'd _never_ had such a strong attraction to someone. Never. And curse his luck, why did it have to be _Merlin_? There were too many levels of wrong associated with Merlin. He was an officer under Arthur's command. He was a friend who trusted him. He was _not_ gay.

_Damn it._

Arthur didn't know how long it was that he stood like that, head down, fingers trying to dig into the stone, resisting the urge to grind his hips against any and every available surface, because the scratch of fabric against his sensitive skin was _not enough_. Eventually, he could let go of the counter, he could stand up straight, and he could follow the very simple instructions on the protein container to make himself a protein shake.

He pulsed the mixture to break up the chunks, held down the blend button for a few seconds, and unlocked the pitcher from the base and turned around.

Arthur nearly dropped the pitcher when he saw Merlin standing there, looking like a guilty kid about to steal something that wasn't his. His good-morning smile was wide and brilliant and innocent, the crinkle reaching his eyes, and the just-awakened, scruffy-haired look over those bright wide eyes did what it wasn't supposed to do, and robbed the breath clean out of Arthur's lungs.

He went for casual and took a large glass out of the cupboard, pouring the protein shake. "I thought I'd have to drag you out of bed. I've been listening to your alarm for ten minutes."

"It's your own fault," Merlin said, petulant and contrary as usual. Arthur glanced at him and saw him pointing to the coffee.

"That's yours. I keep my promises," Arthur said, wondering if Merlin would even remember what Arthur had said on the chopper to get him to focus on the war game.

"Nice one. Thanks."

Arthur half-turned to face him. "How is it my fault that you're about to miss your mum?"

"The bed in the guest room is a little bit too comfortable. How are you ever going to get rid of people?"

"Maybe I don't want to." The words were out of his mouth before he realized he said them, but saying them out loud didn't make it any less true. Morgana had Leon, Lance had Gwen, and most of the team had wives or girlfriends and all of them had family. Arthur had this place, big and empty and impersonal, and no one to share it with. He'd never admit that he was lonely, though, or that he wanted anyone.

That he wouldn't mind if it were Merlin.

He spotted a box he'd tucked next to more party supplies and put it in front of Merlin. "This is yours, too. Already activated, and I programmed in everyone's numbers. Keep it on you." Arthur watched out of the corner of his eye as Merlin cracked the box open, took out the phone, and flipped it around before starting to play with it.

Just like a kid, he was. Arthur allowed himself a small smile that lasted only as long as it took for him to notice the time, and he snapped his fingers in front of Merlin's eyes. "You'll be late. Your mum?"

"Oh, fuck!" Merlin shoved the phone in his pocket, grabbed the coffee and dashed toward the front door, giving Arthur an eyeful of tight Tee and equally-tight black-dye stonewashed jeans that just barely hung onto his hips. The sliver of creamy skin between the hem of his shirt and the edge of his jeans caught Arthur's attention, and it was an effort to look away.

He was absurdly relieved that the kitchen island was between them.

He spotted the house key he'd put aside for Merlin, and called out, "Wait."

Arthur tossed the keys at Merlin, and was surprised that, for once, Merlin did what he was supposed to do and _actually_ caught them, even if it took something of a juggling act to do it. "Your security code's the last six of your ID. Give my regards to your mum. Tell her thanks for the biscuits she sent."

"You mean, the whole roll of biscuits you ate? No wonder you went running this morning. Must have been feeling the extra pounds." Merlin's cheeky grin, full of sharp angles and cutting cheekbones and delight, nearly did Arthur in.

"Oi, are you calling me fat?"

Merlin escaped without really answering. Arthur heard the front door click shut. It was only then that Arthur realized that Merlin had gone off without a jacket. The idiot probably didn't even have one. He waited to see if Merlin would double-back for something heavier than a T-shirt.

A tight, form-fitting and completely indecent shirt.

But he didn't come back, and Arthur cast his eyes to the ceiling to plead whatever God was out there to give him mercy. He rinsed out his glass and the blender pitcher and headed for a shower to do something about the dried sweat and the fact that he was still half-hard.

Arthur stripped out of his shirt and shorts while waiting for the shower to heat up. He stepped under the hot stream, letting the water run down his shoulders and back with a heavy sigh before lifting his chin. His eyes closed under the spray, and he wondered, again, why he ever thought that inviting Merlin to stay at his home was ever a good idea. He ran the bar of soap over his chest and lathered up, moving on to his arms and chest and --

Found the reason why he'd invited Merlin to stay at his home.

 _Fuck._ He hadn't been thinking at all. Just like he hadn't been thinking when he opened the door to Merlin's bedroom with every intention of waking him up and _only_ waking him up, but instead, all of his brainpower went south to a part of his body that had ideas of its own.

The sight of Merlin sprawled half-on, half-under the comforter, one leg stretched apart in invitation, came to him easily, unbidden, and dangerously altered to omit the boxer shorts. Now there was nothing between him and the perfect curve of Merlin's arse, his long, smooth legs, or the delicious expanse of a wiry, muscular back.

"God, Merlin," Arthur whispered, bowing his head under the steady stream of water.

Soap made his cock nice and slippery. He ran his hand over his length over and over again, running his thumb over the slit, mixing pre-come with the soap.

There were bruises on fantasy-Merlin's hips, he decided. Bruises that stood out in dark green and purple black and were the approximate diameter of Arthur's hands, but the angle for a perfect match was wrong. He would've taken Merlin on his back the first time, just so that he could suck territorial marks on his chest, bite at his throat, and kiss those lips, lips that would still be flushed red and wanton the next morning. _This_ next morning.

Arthur gasped softly and wrapped his forefinger and thumb around the base of his cock, holding on, willing himself to keep from coming too fast.

Fantasy-Merlin would still be loose and relaxed from the last night's fuck, still slick from a mixture of Arthur's come and lube. He wouldn't react when Arthur knelt on the bed, as Arthur shifted his legs apart a bit more. He'd moan sleepily, with a small, approving sound, and let Arthur do with him what he would.

He'd run his hands up fantasy-Merlin's legs, up the crease of his arse, up and down the crack and around his puckered hole, gently teasing him open. He'd lean forward, his fingers still working to ready Merlin and kiss his way up the bony spine until he found the bite mark at the crook of that long, milky neck, and bit it again. Merlin would start to wake up, then, only a bit, shifting his body, pushing himself back onto Arthur's fingers, wanting more. Arthur would hold him before he could shift too far back, right where he wanted him, and pull his fingers out, replacing them with his cock.

Arthur couldn't hold himself back. Hot come painted the shower tile in an orgasm that made his knees weak and nearly buckle under him. He continued to stroke until nothing more came out, until he was too sensitive to touch, and leaned against the shower wall, panting for breath.

It wasn't the first time that Arthur wanked to Merlin, but the fantasies were a double edged sword of pleasure that could make him come this hard, and leave him aching for the real thing.

He rubbed his face, shaking his head. If he could wank in the privacy of his own bedroom -- remembering, of course, to lock the door -- maybe twice, three times a day, he might even survive the two weeks of R&R. Hell, he hoped that they'd even be cut short.

Arthur cleaned himself off a second time, shaved, shut off the water, and wrapped a towel around his waist. He was in the middle of getting dressed when his phone rang, alerting to an incoming text message. The number wasn't familiar, but the message was.

_The Dorchester at noon. You're buying. O._

When it came to Olaf Niedermann, of course Arthur was buying. The former MI-5 agent wouldn't have it any other way.

The day in would have to wait. Arthur left his comfortable trackpants and T-shirt on the bed, pulled out a suit and called the Dorchester for reservations.

* * *

The Alain Ducasse at The Dorchester restaurant was notoriously hard to get into, particularly at lunchtime when the tourists descended on the famous hotel _en masse_ , eager to sample fine dining on a budget -- if that budget included the food allowance for two days. It was easy to spot the tourists -- they jostled each other in front of the maître d', wore loud, obnoxious clothing, and were loud and obnoxious in general. A few polished foreigners blended in with the relaxed elegance of old money, while one couple in expensive tailored clothing betrayed their roots as _nouveau riche_ with nervous facial tics and movements.

Most of them had no reservation, no intention of following the dress code, and no common sense whatsoever. The maître d' spied Arthur's entrance and waved him forward, past an outraged and over-done American woman who could only be best described as a floozy in a plunging fake-tan neckline and a horrendous Wall of Hair.

"Arthur Pendragon, for two," Arthur said.

"How rude! They think they can just barge past us, don't they? Why don't you do something, Walter?" The woman said, elbowing a bored rotund man with a sharp elbow. When he didn't do anything, she crossed her arms and scowled.

"Please come with me, sir," the maître d' said, and stepped aside. The woman blocked him.

"Why does he get to go? We've been waiting for _hours_. If this is how you treat your important clients..." The Wall of Hair's voice was high-pitched, nasal, and snide, but the maître d' turned to her with a thin, polite smile before nodding with a more friendly expression to Arthur.

"The gentleman has a reservation, _madame_ ," the maître d' said, loud enough for the Americans at the end of the queue to hear.

"A _reservation_ ," the woman mocked, looking back for support. "Oh, I'm sure he's got a reservation. This is discrimination, that's what it is. They're serving the British before their betters."

The maître d' looked pained. " _Madame_ \--"

"No! No. I demand to be seated immediately."

"In that case, don't let us stop you. There are chairs behind you," Arthur suggested, gesturing at the wall. The chairs only came out at lunchtime, when there was an influx of people waiting to get in; the dinner crowd knew better than to try to get a table without a reservation.

"Indeed," a finely-dressed older lady said from behind Arthur, giving the Wall of Hair a disapproving once-over and a pleasant smile in the way only the well-bred aristocrat could. "Do go on, young Mister Pendragon, and don't mind the rabble."

"Lady Tomlinson, always a pleasure," Arthur said, pausing long enough to kiss the back of her hand. They shared an amused smirk directed toward the Wall of Hair, and Arthur added, "Enjoy your lunch."

"That might be something of a challenge," Lady Tomlinson sniffed, glancing toward the Americans.

The woman stared at Arthur at the two of them with the surprise of someone who wasn't entirely certain if she'd been insulted, and her mouth moved, but no sound came out. The maître d' gave Arthur a grateful look that amounted to _it's been like that for the last hour_ , and whatever frayed nerves he had were smoothed down by placid French decorum as he led Arthur to a private table against the wall, toward the rear, in a darkened alcove with the perfect view of the room. It was their usual table, and Arthur took the seat that would give Olaf line-of-sight of the front door.

Olaf wouldn't be able to concentrate otherwise.

Arthur was gratified to see Lady Tomlinson seated almost immediately after him, leaving the Americans to loiter and glower a little longer.

He ordered two glasses of wine -- a deep House Merlot for himself, a fruity Shiraz for Olaf, and Olaf joined him moments after the drinks were delivered by a tuxedoed waiter who knew the meaning of discretion. He slid into his seat without preamble, and said, "Your family day, and you choose to spend it with me. Really, Arthur, I'm terribly flattered."

Olaf Niedermann was a short man, a little shorter than Arthur, but he more than made up for it in sheer presence. His hair was a dusty white that went prematurely grey in his late thirties, and it was no less white now that he was in his sixties. His dark eyes were as sharp and piercing as ever, but the laugh lines weren't laugh lines at all, weighing him down with a nearly perpetual frown. He was dressed in a nice, fine navy-blue suit that spelled out Old Family Money to anyone who might miss it in his demeanour, and the gold thread in his shiny tie competed with the flash of his watch, the glimmer of his cuff links, and the ostentatious ring with his family crest on his left index finger.

"What can I say, Olaf? I enjoy your company."

The truth was, Arthur tolerated Olaf's company only as long as his daughter, Vivian, wasn't around. Olaf doted on the obnoxious, thrice-spoiled, self-indulgent, the-world-revolved-around-her Vivian, oblivious to her very glaring flaws and jealously protective of her well-being.

Ten, fifteen years ago, Olaf had nearly killed Arthur when he barged in on a party at the Pendragon house and found Vivian grinding her hips in Arthur's lap in a very vain and foolish attempt to get him interested in dating her while Arthur was trying desperately to get her off his lap on mortified principle. After Olaf had wrenched Vivian away, nearly throwing her across the room, he came after Arthur.

What should have been, in theory, a very short fight -- at the time, Olaf was an active, and very dangerously deadly MI-5 agent at the time -- turned in a very long fight that wrecked a good third of the Pendragon house. Arthur fended him off trying to explain, _no, wait, I'm not interested in your daughter, and I swear nothing happened_ , and Olaf came close to giving himself a stroke shouting, _what! How dare you say she's not good enough for you_. It was a ridiculous show that entertained the people who had stuck around to watch Arthur fend Olaf off while climbing over the furniture, throwing whatever came at hand, and fighting back. Olaf eventually realized that Uther didn't raise his son to be a pushover and switched to a more immediate solution to his problem: he raised a gun.

The situation had been defused only when Arthur held up his hands and leaned forward to say, "Mister Niedermann. Nothing could ever happen between Vivian and me. I promise you. She's absolutely, one-hundred-percent safe with me. I'm completely, irrevocably _gay_."

The revelation hadn't sunk in for several seconds, and Olaf dropped his gun and said "Oh."

It was echoed a moment later behind Arthur when Uther said, "Oh." Except where Olaf had been relieved, Uther had been nothing of the sort.

Arthur had recovered from that incident -- Uther's absolute fury had been epic, Vivian's tearful _oh no, I turned him gay_ caused a meltdown at school, and Olaf had been so happy, he'd charged Arthur with keeping an eye on Vivian, which ended up being more of Arthur making sure that none of her myriad of hopeful and hopeless boyfriends ever found themselves on the other end of Olaf's gun -- with a few psychological scars, but he'd come out of it with an important ally in his pocket.

"I'm impressed. You say that with such a straight face." Olaf took the wineglass in hand, swirled it before taking a deep breath, and took one single, pretend-sip, because he'd never drink in public again, not after that embarrassing fiasco at the Belgium Embassy in 2004, when he'd called a vacationing Arthur ("How'd you know I was in Belgium?" "I'm a secret agent, I know everything") to bail him out of the drunk tank.

"I've been practicing in front of the mirror," Arthur said. He nodded to the waiter hovering out of earshot, waiting to see if either of them were ready to order. The waiter came over, and Arthur said, without even looking at the menu, "I'll have the langoustine ravioli."

"The steak," Olaf said, passing his menu to the waiter.

They stared at each other in measured silence after the waiter walked away, and Olaf leaned back in his seat, crossing his legs, imitating Arthur's pose.

"So. You're moving up in the world."

"I am?" Arthur asked, amused. "What is it this time? I'm being promoted to Major? I mean, after all, I learned about my last promotion from you."

"Your clearance," Olaf said. "You got a nice little bump. To be honest, I didn't think you had it in you to flat out bargain for it. I thought you'd go for a couple new bars on your shoulder instead."

"It turns out that privilege doesn't always come with rank," Arthur said, and of course Olaf would already know about that. It was a mantra with the man -- _I'm a secret agent. I know everything_.

"Your boys did good on their last job," Olaf said. "Really showed their mettle on the field. They really were under insufferable conditions."

"You're surprised?"

"Of course I am," Olaf said with a condescending snort. "A boy your age has no business going around playing knights on the battlefield."

Arthur sipped his drink. "Are you still put out that I turned you down?"

Olaf broke his mirror pose and leaned forward, an arm crooked on the table. "You should have let me recruit you. You're wasted where you are."

"I like where I am, Olaf." It was an old argument between them. Olaf had been trying to lure Arthur into Her Majesty's Secret Service since he passed his A-levels.

The staring match lasted a few minutes, and Olaf broke the eye contact first with a knuckle rap on the table. "You'd sign with me before you'd sign with CIA, wouldn't you?"

"Of course I would," Arthur said, "But since that will never happen, you have absolutely nothing to worry about."

Olaf pretend-sipped at his Shiraz, but this time it wasn't a pretend-sip after all, and he drank deeply before swishing the flavour around in his mouth and swallowing it down. "How is Daly? I heard he was trying a new weight loss plan."

"He looked trim and fit to me," Arthur said, reflecting that he should be acting upset that Olaf already knew about his meeting with the Americans, but this was the opening that he'd been waiting for. "He was letting his pit bull do most of the talking, though."

"Pit bull? Baker? That man is socially stunted. He can't even make eye contact with a girl."

"Oh, no, not Baker. He was there, though. Quiet as a church mouse, as the saying goes -- all big ears listening to everything that was going on, and eyes only for his computer. He was with a different agent."

Olaf 's poker face slipped a little, and he frowned at a detail he hadn't known. "Did you catch his name?"

"William Aulfric. There was another analyst there. Sophia Lee," Arthur said. He fell silent when the waiter delivered their meals. Arthur shook out and draped the cloth napkin across his lap, spearing a shrimp.

Olaf was halfway through his steak before he asked, "What did they want to talk to you about?"

Arthur dismissed the question with a wave of his fork. "Oh, this and that."

Olaf's eye twitched faintly, and Arthur knew he was dying of curiosity. Either that, or he was desperate to confirm the rumours that he'd heard. Arthur was banking on the latter. "Don't you already know?"

"You have to say it first, Arthur. You know the rules."

"Oh, there's rules now?" Arthur raised a brow.

"There's always rules."

Arthur was in no rush to play Olaf's game, and continued to eat. "Mordred ap Aneurin, Jonathan Aredian, and a disgusting fellow named the Jester."

"Sam Trickler," Olaf offered.

"You know them?"

Olaf's brows pinched in the middle of his forehead and he scoffed. "I'm a secret agent. I know everything."

"Please feel free to share," Arthur said, waving his fork in the air again. "Alleviate the pain that is my ignorance."

Olaf stared at him, and broke into a loud chuckle. "Nice. You almost have that aristocratic sneer down pat. Are you sure I can't tempt you into a little transfer between divisions in Her Majesty's Service?"

"Not hardly. I've listened to you complain enough that the pay is shite," Arthur said.

"It is. I can't afford this suit. It's a rental."

Arthur rolled his eyes. They both knew that Olaf wasn't in it for the money -- he was in it for the adrenaline rush, the power grab, and to sate his personal obsessive-compulsive micromanaging demon. If he bled, he bled Old Money that took care of his every frivolous need.

"So what can you tell me?"

"What makes you think that I'll tell you anything?"

"Saving your bacon in Turkmenistan. Taking a little unauthorized side trip with my team in Islamabad to rescue some of your boys. What about the sky drop outside of Rome to escort Vivian to that party you didn't want her to go to in the first place?" Arthur pointed his fork at him. "You owe me."

Olaf's expression soured.

Arthur knew that Olaf wouldn't tell him anything if he hadn't already meant to tell Arthur anyway, because it was in his best benefit to share the information. Why it was in Olaf's best benefit -- Arthur would either never know, or he'd find out after getting Olaf good and drunk.

Olaf took a deep breath. "Sam Trickler has a rap sheet as long as my leg. Drug trafficking, slave smuggling, the black market, but he's never been indicted. Either someone posts his bond and he disappears, or the witness disappears, or there's not enough evidence all around. But he's an idiot. He dreams up big schemes that come crashing down around his ears, but he somehow, miraculously, always escapes."

Olaf cut a bite-sized morsel of his steak before continuing. "Jonathan Aredian, also known as the Witchfinder, is a bit of a mercenary who moonlights as his own independent weapons dealer. At least, that's what Daly and the CIA think, but he's more of a weapons broker. He handshakes the people who want things with people who sell them."

"Why do you call him the Witchfinder?"

"We don't call him that. He calls himself that," Olaf said. At Arthur's questioning _why?_ gesture, Olaf continued, "He's a bit of a purist. Philosophy degree from Rhodes University, where he was tossed out for a rather controversial pro-Nazi treatise based on Nietzsche's Ubermensch -- and trust me, it really was an obnoxious piece of propaganda if he could get himself tossed out for _that_ during the twilight years of apartheid in South Africa. He's convinced himself that there's a race of people that were working for the Ahnenerbe, or escaped the Ahnenerbe, who were capable of using magic or some sort of mystical tomfoolery against their enemies. Aredian's obsessed with the occult -- he's collected nearly every historical treatise on witchcraft in Europe. He calls himself the Witchfinder because he goes out and finds witches."

Arthur raised a brow -- it was the only thing he could do that wouldn't reveal his unexpected surprise. It came back to _the weird stuff the boys were telling me about._ He cleared his throat and leaned forward. "Never mind the absolute absurdity of what you've just said, but why would he do that?"

Olaf regarded him with a measuring look before half-chuckling. "This isn't where I tell you that magic is real. This is where I tell you to start thinking that, maybe, Aredian's a sociopath who aspires to the creation of a pure race and he wants to use these smoke-and-mirror people to be his Adams and Eves. Or maybe he sees them as an abomination and thinks we should start up the Inquisition again and drown them all. Who knows.

"Either way, maybe you should start asking questions." Olaf paused. "The _right_ questions."

Arthur frowned and put down his fork. "Mordred."

"Now that's one of the right questions," Olaf said, pushing away his plate and leaving the greens uneaten. "I wish I had an answer for you. I can't tell you more than what Daly told you --"

"New world order," Arthur interrupted.

Olaf sat back suddenly, giving Arthur an appraising -- and approving -- look. "Now, I know he didn't tell you that."

"So, you do the talking, then," Arthur said. He was getting tired of this. First Daly and Aulfric, and now Olaf -- all of them trying to put him off of Mordred ap Aneurin. The request came out as an order, the sort of order he barked at men who weren't on his team when he expected to be obeyed. It was the wrong tone to take with Olaf, but Olaf only watched him speculatively.

"Are you certain --"

"No, Olaf. I don't want to join MI-5. I don't want to become the next 007. I don't want to be a super-spy who snogs his way through a pantheon of lovely women at the end of a mission, because, hello, I'm not interested in women," Arthur said. "Tell me about the new world order."

Olaf made a soft hmm-ing noise. "I'm thinking about dessert."

Arthur took a deep breath and sighed softly, resisting the urge to roll his eyes. "Dessert sounds nice. Peach cobbler with a raspberry reduction? Or, maybe, the maple crème brûlée?"

Olaf smiled. "Am I that predictable?"

"You? Never."

"I'll have the cobbler, I think. And you will have dessert later," Olaf said. "His name is Edwin Muirden. I'll make certain that he calls you."

 

  


**ooOOoo**  


 

Arthur woke Merlin up for the morning run, turning the lights on in the pitch-black bedroom and tossing him the running flats he'd remembered to pack when he brought over a load of his clothes along with all the food his Mum had baked.

An hour in, Merlin wished he'd conveniently forgotten the runners at Uncle Gaius' place.

The pre-dawn morning run started innocently enough -- Merlin could barely string two words together, and Arthur had seen him in this state before on missions that started Too Early and just shy of Buttcrack of Dawn, so he didn't have to talk much. And that was a _good_ thing, because Arthur was wearing a tight Tee again and dark navy-blue shorts that shimmered as he ran that made Merlin even more incoherent.

Also, they made his arse look amazing.

It just wasn't fair.

They were joined at some point by Leon, who lived in a complicated arrangement with Morgana, since he didn't have family in London, and he still pointedly refused to propose until he completed his tour in the army. A little further on, Lance took his place in a two-man column, and by that point, Merlin was able to grunt something that at least sounded like "Morning."

Arthur had kept him up far too late the night before, and unfortunately, _not_ in the way that Merlin liked being kept up. They watched a few movies -- **Transformers** , because it was absolutely ridiculous, then **Wanted** , because it was just plain awesome, followed by **Aliens versus Predators** , which had them howling with laughter toward the end, with Arthur too breathless to argue the merits and flaws of their battle tactics, and Merlin gasping for air every time Arthur barked a doubtful, " _Really_? On what planet?" at some implausible approach or attack.

("Obviously, this one, but they failed to take into account the increased gravity compared to the ship-flight gravity, the higher oxygen-to-nitrogen ratio, and oh, bollocks, I don't know, every rule in the physics rulebook?" Merlin had answered.)

While Merlin was paying for the less than four hours of sleep, Arthur looked as if he went to bed and had his full eight hours like a sensible person, and Merlin hated him for it, just like he hated Arthur for looking so brilliant and glowing and gorgeous in a plain white T-shirt and shorts and runners first thing in the god _damn_ morning.

Gwaine joined them at some point, appearing out of nowhere behind a building, and there was no missing Perceval when he jaywalked -- or rather, jay-ran -- across an empty four-laner and clubbed Merlin on the shoulder, staggering him out of step.

By the time they arrived at the park that was well outside the downtown core and commandeered the rough trails, Merlin was sure they made a spectacle. Combined they were a sixteen-man squad running in a two-column formation, every single one of them as fit as a Greek sculpture, broad shouldered, tapered waists, muscular all the way through. Perceval was the tallest and most heavily-muscled of them, but he kept up effortlessly. There was Owain, whose oversized-but-torn shirt did absolutely _shite_ to cover up the fact that there wasn’t an ounce of fat on him. Gwaine was as sleek as a triathlete, Lance was a Spanish God running in the wind, and there was Arthur, absolutely, completely perfect, golden in the pinkish tinge of the orange sky as the sun rose, setting the pace at the head of the ranks.

No one could mistake him for anything other than their leader, the man that they'd follow no matter what, through the worst of the battlements all the way to the mouth of Hell and beyond, and if anyone ever questioned why, well, if they couldn't work it out for themselves just by looking at him, then they were _blind_.

The team together was nice on the eyes -- more than nice, if Merlin had to admit it. More than a few heads turned in the early-morning crowd to watch them go by. Everyone caught someone's attention -- everyone, that was, except for Merlin, because he might be taller than some of the team and on-par with most of the others, but he was skinny and scrawny, his only redeeming grace in the simple fact that even without enough caffeine to give him some semblance of consciousness, he could still keep up.

That was more than he could say for the recreational runners who did their best to stay on their trail, or for the off-duty coppers who sprinted after them. "On R&R again, Arthur?" one of them asked, breathless, struggling to keep even at the front, a foot or two ahead of Merlin.

"Didn't you use to be able to keep up with us, Tommy?" Arthur remarked, raising an imperious, kingly brow, and Merlin coughed and grinned the same way that Leon coughed and grinned, Lance too polite to do anything but smile encouragingly at the other man.

"Fuck you, that was a year and two deserts ago," Tommy panted, brushing the back of a sweat-sodden arm to wipe the drips from his eyes. "The coppers training is _nursery school_ compared to you lot."

"Oi! Don't let your fellow coppers hear you talk like that," Owain said from somewhere behind him, and if there was a bit of an edge to his voice, it was only because he came from a long line of highly-decorated police officers.

"Yeah, mate, if they could catch me, I'd worry," Tommy said, heaving for breath. "Shite! I hope you're here for a while, I could use some work."

"That's putting it mildly," Arthur said. He glanced over his shoulder at the team behind him, his eyes glancing at Merlin for a brief, considering moment that nearly made Merlin's chest explode, and looked back at Tommy. "You up for a bit of footie this afternoon?"

"Always," Tommy said with a grin. "I'll call my crew, see who's free. The usual place?"

"At two?"

"Bring the balls and the beers. We'll take care of the rest," Tommy said and stayed with the team until a fork in the road when he veered right toward the city proper.

"Boys," Arthur announced, "We've got a game."

The team cheered, but Merlin winced.

* * *

The team followed the loop a second time before heading back into town by a different route than the one that brought them to the park, and they slowed down some before heading to the gym. It was early morning and the early morning crowd was there, but everyone knew where everything was with the ease of people who'd been there before, leaving Merlin to flail a little until Gwaine took pity on him and took him on a tour. The gym was a mixture of cardio on one floor, circuit training for the slim bodies that didn't want to do much more but to keep on looking slim on a different floor, with two entire levels devoted to the sort of hardcore training where someone like Merlin -- rail-thin compared to the men who had so much muscle, they couldn't touch their elbows to their own ribcages -- had no business being.

He'd gotten himself settled on the chest-press bench, with no intention of doing anything but laying there and admiring the bare ceiling with its matte-black painted tubes and rafters and maybe catching a few winks, when one of the muscleheads loomed over him and said, "Gerroff."

"Sorry?"

"I said, get off."

"Gym courtesy, mate. I'm in the middle of using it."

The musclehead glanced at the empty bar, and snorted. "Yeah, fat lot it's doing you, too."

Merlin didn't get up, but he poked at his own chest. "I'll have you know I'm stronger than I look."

The clunk of large rings -- three stones if the sizes were anything to go by -- startled them both, and Merlin grinned up at Perceval, who held up another weight. "Six on each end, right, Merlin? Or do you want it up another stone?"

"Let's not and say we did," Merlin said, cheeky grin and all, and his smile widened when he saw Perceval's eyes roll indulgingly.

"Don't let Arthur catch you being lazy, then, because I'm not coming to your rescue," Perceval said. "Man's on a mission."

"Tell me about it. Are those runs usually that long?"

"Not by half," Perceval said, shooting the musclehead a wary look. "Go on. I'll spot you."

The musclehead took the hint and went to another bench, but Merlin could feel the other man's eyes on him all through his workout, which led to Gwaine noticing and nodding in his direction. "You have an admirer."

Arthur, who was nearby, glanced up and around, from Merlin to the rest of the room, his brows furrowed in a frown before turning away to focus on his next set. Merlin was glad that Gwaine stood in between them, because he didn't think he'd be able to tear his eyes from Arthur.

He was doing squats. _Squats!_ How was Merlin supposed to concentrate when Arthur stuck his arse out like that?

"Who? Him?" Merlin spotted the musclehead and shrugged. "Should I worry?"

"Bit of a pillock, that one, and a bit of a pusher," Gwaine said, making a needle-injecting motion with his hand against his arm, hinting at steroids.

"Stay with us, and you'll be fine. Eventually, he'll figure out that you're not to be messed with," Perceval said.

"Or else what?"

"Or else he meets the team," Perceval said with slight shrug that could be interpreted as _obviously_. "And if that doesn't work, we sent Arthur after him."

Merlin half-laughed. "Like a junkyard dog? Big and shaggy and menacing?"

"Oi!" Arthur hooked the barbells on the stand and turned around. "A purebred Alsatian, at the very least, yeah?"

Merlin snorted. "Figures you'd pick the most overrated guard dog in the universe."

"And what do you figure you'd be?" Arthur asked, reaching for a towel. "A Dalmatian?"

"A Dalmatian? Why a Dalmatian?"

"Hyper, clumsy and scatterbrained," Arthur said, grinning.

"Hey!" Merlin frowned, then said, "Well, that doesn't sound so bad. At least I'd get to ride a fire truck. I'd say that's a step-up from what you'd be doing if you were your fancy-schmancy Alsatian."

"And what's that?"

"Sniffing sheep arse."

That brought a roar of whooping laughter from Gwaine, who choked on the mouthful of water he'd been drinking from a bottle, and coughed so hard Arthur had to alternatingly thump him in the back and scowl at him for some reason that Merlin couldn't fathom. Merlin used the moment to point and laugh, then escape. He found an unoccupied pull-up bar in a corner of the gym and jumped up to grab it.

One. Two.

"Hey, twink."

Three. Four.

"I'm talking to you."

Five. Merlin glanced sideways at the musclehead from the chest press bench. Six.

He felt a hand on his ankle, the fingers digging in.

Seven.

He grunted with effort, because the musclehead was pulling him down.

"Piss... off..." Merlin kicked his leg free.

Eight. Nine. Ten. He risked another glance and saw that the musclehead was walking away, pretending not to be looking sullenly in Merlin's direction.

Fourteen. Fifteen.

Merlin glanced in the other direction and saw Arthur, a towel over his shoulder, leaning against one of the racks, his arms crossed over his chest. He was watching the musclehead, but staying on Merlin's other side a bare arm's reach away. Merlin felt a pang of irritated annoyance, finished his set (he didn't do an extra ten on purpose, just to show off), and dropped down to glare at Arthur.

"I told you before I don't need you to protect me."

Arthur had the temerity to smirk. "No, _Mer_ lin. You don't _want_ me to protect you, and you're too much of an idiot to realize that you _need_ protecting. You're part of Excalibur. Live with it."

He turned away before Merlin could answer. Merlin raised two fingers at Arthur's retreating back instead.

* * *

While everyone scattered to shower and change in their own homes, Merlin followed Arthur to the flat to wash up, and followed him again to Gwen and Lance's place. They had extra clothes for the footie match, with Merlin's in a borrowed duffel bag that smelled of old stale sweat and of _Arthur_ in a way that made Merlin shiver.

Breakfast was a fiasco of too many bodies in too small a space that somehow fit everyone in perfectly, and there were loud voices and shouting from one side of the building in the living room to someone else who was on the other side in the kitchen. The telly was playing and footie was on, with Manchester United playing against -- he didn't catch who they were, some blokes in yellow and green, and it didn't seem to matter because Man U was _winning_ , and the roar from Galahad and Gawain and Geraint -- the three G's -- from around the big flatscreen was deafening --

But not nearly as deafening as Morgana, who barged in with Leon in tow, freshly showered and changed from the run and from the gym, and hefting a large plate of deli meats and cheese and fruits and a large grocery bag of more fresh-baked bread and eggs and ham and beans from the grocery because _they're eating us of house and home and they've barely got here_ , and Gwen and Lance and everyone else cheered in celebration --

It wasn't just the team -- it was the team and their families, their mothers and fathers and siblings, their girlfriends and wives and, in Gwaine's case, a temporary significant other that he'd picked up in the bar the night before. There was a wonderful reunion of wide-armed hugs and two-cheeked kisses and laughing "Has it been that long" and "Do you remember when" that almost drowned out the sound from the telly, but not quite, because one of the three G's had possession of the remote and increased the volume --

And all that Merlin could do was stand just inside the house, in a corner that someone had miraculously not occupied, and stare, awed, amazed, and completely overwhelmed. It was too much. All these people, the family members, the friends, the team -- they'd known each other seemingly forever, and they were all one large extended family...

He was the outsider.

Everyone was talking to someone. Leon was chatting with an older woman who looked to be Lance's mum. The three G's were arguing with each other while trying to teach Gwen's younger brother -- Merlin only heard his name in passing and couldn't remember it now -- the finer points of a good footie game. Perceval had been pinned to the wall by two young women who were related to another team member, holding his arms out as if he was right scared of them. Gwen and Lance and Morgana had taken over the kitchen, soundly preventing everyone, even Arthur, from walking around the island to help themselves to whatever was smelling so _good_.

Merlin didn't fit in.

He turned around and walked out of the house. The pressure on his chest eased immediately. He staggered down the front steps and sat down on the last one, his feet on the sidewalk, his elbows on his knees.

Merlin wished he'd known that it was a family affair, because then, he would've asked Uncle Gaius to come. Gaius would have loved this sort of gathering -- he thrived equally in large groups as he did with only one other person, because he was the caretaker sort, just like Gwen seemed to be, and if he were here, Gaius would have taken over her kitchen, too, fending off intruders while he whipped up a feast the way Hunith could bake up a storm, and fed the whole lot of them on little else but crackers and cheese spread.

At the same time, he wanted to be in the quiet of Uncle Gaius' workshop, where he knew he belonged, surrounded by gadgets and tools and electronics and a single, doting family member who would cuff him on the back of his head and tell him, "Now fix it without your magic, boy."

Merlin smiled to himself and stared at his hands.

He didn't know how long he was out there, comparing the life line on his left palm with the long crack on the sidewalk. It must have been a while because he was feeling cool despite the sunshine drifting through thick grey clouds overhead, and the open and shut of the door behind him hinted that people were getting ready to leave. Merlin slid across the step, out of the way, so that no one would trip over him.

Instead, a plate heaped with food was shoved unceremoniously under his nose and onto his lap. Arthur sat down next to him.

"It can get a bit much," Arthur said, picking up the plastic fork on his plate and shovelling food in his mouth.

Merlin stared at him. The last thing he expected was for the golden boy to tear himself away from the group and to come outside. In fact, he really shouldn't be outside with Merlin; the team, the family -- they were together because they wanted the _team_.

"What are you doing out here?"

Arthur glanced at him, an eyebrow raised as if Merlin was an idiot, as usual, and said, his mouth half-full of food, "Eating. Obviously."

"Obviously," Merlin said slowly, and looked at the dish in his hands. It was heaped full of the usual staples that he took from the mess hall on base -- but far better quality and it actually looked palatable. There was a fork on his plate, so it was meant for him, and wasn't Captain Prat's second plate -- not that Captain Prat would eat half the food that was there -- it was more vegetable than meat. Merlin shoved aside the big slab of ham to get to the roasted zucchini, and Arthur stabbed the bit of meat with his fork. It dangled in the air precariously before he caught it with his plate.

"But why are you out _here_?" Merlin asked. The green beans were still fresh-crisp, but the ends hadn't been cut off; he wondered if Lance had been tasked to cleaning them, but had sullenly missed a whole bunch.

"Didn't you hear me? I said, it can get a bit much."

"Of all people, I thought you'd be used to that," Merlin said in-between bites. "I mean, you grew up with them, yeah?"

Arthur shrugged a shoulder. "Most of them. Leon and I were thick as thieves as kids. Then high school came around and we joined the footie team, and that's where we met Lance, Owain, and Perceval. Gwaine transferred into school, and most of the others were already there, on the team or knew someone else, and it snowballed from there. Some of them joined up, some of them didn't."

He glanced over his shoulder at the closed door. "Between you and me, I can handle the team. I can handle their families. But all of them together?"

Arthur shook his head and used the edge of his fork to cut up a bit of chicken. "I'd rather be in a foxhole somewhere being bombarded by enemy fire. It's a lot quieter."

Merlin chuckled.

They ate in silence for a few minutes before Arthur spoke again, gesturing with a thumb over his shoulder. "Too much for you too, I suppose?"

Merlin didn't answer. Arthur nudged his arm with his elbow, the contact coursing through Merlin like an electric shock.

"It's not that," Merlin said finally, balancing the paper plate on his lap and using his fingers to move some of the food around. It looked as if Arthur had slopped the food with no real thought for accessibility. The potato mash smothered the carrots almost completely. "I mean, it's just me and Mum and Uncle Gaius, and there was Will. A few friends in school, but we mostly lost touch when I went to uni, then I _really_ lost touch when I joined up. But Uncle Gaius and Mum host parties sometimes that have like a hundred people all together in a space not much bigger than this..."

Merlin tossed his head back to indicate the house and shrugged. He didn't explain about the parties -- solstice celebrations, Samhain silences and obeisance, a few rites and rituals. He wasn't sure how Arthur would react to knowing about the Old Religion, even though talk and gossip about neo-paganism was old news by now, with most detractors reduced to ornery old curmudgeons on the opinions page of the newspapers. Neo-paganism was one thing -- some of the sects and cults were operating on the principles of pseudo-archaeology, making it up as they went along, but the Old Religion was the Old Religion, and guarded jealously.

"Too bad about your mum being out of the country. But you could've asked your uncle to come. Better yet, give me both their numbers and I'll put them on everyone's list, so that we can all keep in touch." Arthur studied Merlin with a scrutiny that made Merlin want to wipe at his mouth in case he had something smeared on his face, and Arthur asked, "What is it, then?"

Merlin chewed his lower lip, moving the fork around a congealed mass that might have been meat at some point, but had been cooked to death in a casserole of some sort.

"Oh, that's Gail's mystery stew. It's rather good. She won't tell us what's in it, and we've been trying to guess for ages. Maybe you'll have better luck? It's not beef, veal, lamb, chicken, turkey, pheasant, snake, kangaroo, buffalo, salmon, halibut or narwhal --"

"Narwhal?"

"Gwaine was grasping at straws that day."

Merlin laughed and was rewarded by Arthur's bemused expression, so he took a bite of the smallest bit. The stew itself was full of flavour, if a little heavy on the spices, and the meat a bit on the chewy side. It was familiar, and not quite.

"So, Merlin?" Arthur asked.

"I'm not sure yet." Merlin rolled the bit of meat in his mouth, trying to get a grasp on the taste and texture.

"I meant the other thing."

"I know," Merlin sighed. "Look. Um. You had a radio guy before, you know, originally? What happened to him?"

"We didn't know him. He was assigned to us," Arthur said, his tone quiet. "Ian McGilvray. Nice enough bloke, if a bit stiff-upper-lip. Didn't get on with some of the team -- couldn't see past some personality quirks, I suppose, and he definitely couldn't see past Gwaine being open about, you know, who he sleeps with, but he was outnumbered, so he kept his mouth shut and his head down most of the time. We thought we'd rub off on him after a while, that he'd relax and fit in, but seemed like we'd see pigs fly first. He never came out for drinks, never joined us on R&R. Arm's-length all the way."

Arthur paused, his brow pinching in a way that Merlin knew meant he was putting his thoughts through a diplomacy filter before speaking. "He stuck it out for a year and change. Then we got a call in. We had an off-the-books mission and it went sideways. We made it out, all of us, but at the end of it, he asked for a transfer and I signed the papers, no hard feelings, told him he could come back if he wanted. He packed his things and left and never said good-bye.

"He's working a desk job now." Arthur glanced at his plate, then at Merlin's, and helped himself to a drumstick that Merlin hadn't touched yet.

"So, he didn't fit in either," Merlin said quietly. Arthur looked at him sharply.

"No. McGilvray didn't fit in," Arthur said finally, wiping greasy fingers on his jeans before putting a hand on Merlin's shoulder and squeezed tight. "But you do."

There was a long pause, the heat of Arthur's hand seeping through Merlin's shirt, through his skin, warming him where he'd been chilled. Merlin met his eyes, blue eyes to blue, trying to divine whether there was a hidden meaning in Arthur's words, a twist to them, a teasing tone.

"You fit in, Merlin."

He drew his hand away and picked up his fork, moving some of his mash around and chasing after a heavily-sauced meatball.

Merlin stared at him, surprised, stunned, warmed, his lips quirking in a smile before he finally returned his attention to his plate.

"Rat," Merlin said suddenly.

"What?" Arthur's head snapped at him, his expression wavering between confused and offended.

"Rat," Merlin said, pointing toward the mystery stew with a fork. "I'm pretty sure it's rat."

An eyebrow rose slowly, and Arthur tilted his head to ask, "And you know this how?"

"School trip to an arsehole town in the middle of nowhere. Will and me, we were, well, we got cut off from the others -- don't ask how, it's kind of a given with Will, and we were _starving_. We had enough euros on us for a bit of food at this backyard restaurant, but we couldn't read the menu, and, well. We asked, after. Rat."

Arthur looked stricken, his eyes drifting from Merlin down to Merlin's plate and the little mound of stew. Merlin speared another piece of meat from the stew, popped it in his mouth, and chewed.

After a moment, he nodded and offered Arthur his plate. "Yeah. Rat. You want some?"

Arthur stared at Merlin for several long moments, the edges of him turning green. "Oh, _bollocks_. I really hope that's not it."

"I'm pretty sure, Arthur."

Arthur got up and headed into the house in a hurry.

* * *

Despite what Arthur had said, Merlin honestly didn't think that it would take this long before he was kicked off the team. It took them twenty minutes to figure out that Merlin was an uncoordinated buffoon on the green, and ten more minutes before they convinced Arthur and Leon and Lance that they would be able to do something about their surprising points deficit if only Merlin would stop playing for the _other_ team, however accidentally.

There had been an exchange of glances between Arthur and Leon at the mere suggestion to boot Merlin from the game, and Merlin couldn't help but feel a mixture of embarrassment and dread. Had Arthur said anything about Merlin's insecurities? It wasn't as if he could help feeling as if he didn't fit in. One look at the rest of Excalibur, and _anyone_ would wonder what he was doing with them. He hoped that they weren't planning anything, or that Arthur hadn't talked to anyone else. It was easy enough to chalk Lance's reluctance to dump Merlin from the team as Lance being good-natured as always, but eventually, even Lance had to see the light when the CO19 Force Firearms Unit scored another goal.

Merlin went to sit it out on bleachers that hosted the pantheon of family and friends from both teams -- and a good measure of random strangers who'd wandered through the park, then detoured for the show. A trio of giggling girls -- dear God, was it even humanely possible to have voices at such high pitches and not attract animals -- sat down near him.

"Oh! I like that one, the big one," one of them said. The only big one on the field was Perceval -- the nearest candidate was Owain, and the one after that was an officer from the CO19 who was a bit grim-looking.

"What about him?" The brunette among the three -- the only natural hair colour, too -- covered her mouth so that no one could hear what she was saying, if only she weren't talking so loudly in the first place. Her eyes were following Gwaine. "I could go for him."

"Of course you would. You like the scruffy pirate look," her friend answered snidely, as if it was some sort of joke between them. "I could care less. I want _him_."

She pointed at Arthur.

Merlin studied her for a moment -- she was thin and willowy and blonde, with a pretty face and pouty lips and too much black eyeliner, and he sincerely hoped that she would _go away right now before Arthur saw her_.

The whispering grew more intense, and he was distantly aware that the girls were glancing in his direction. One of them slid over -- the one with the irritating self-entitled tone of voice -- and tapped his arm.

"Excuse me, which team are you on?"

Merlin gestured. "Theirs."

The girls conferred, and the giggling continued before the girl came back. "Do you think you could introduce us?"

Morgana and Gwen and some of the girlfriends and wives had stayed behind to do the cleaning-up, but they arrived at the park in full force at that moment, climbing up onto the bleachers and finding room wherever there was room to be had, and Morgana led the charge by telling Merlin to move over while glaring at the girl next to him. There wasn't anywhere for Merlin _to_ move -- he was on the edge of the bench -- but he got the hint when Gwen moved to sit on his other side, and Morgana shoved the girl next to him and sat down between them.

 _Thank you,_ Merlin thought, giving her a grateful smile.

"We were _talking_!" the girl protested.

Morgana barely gave her another look. "No, you weren't."

"But he was going to bring us to meet the team --"

"No, he wasn't," Morgana said, rounding on the three girls. "Whatever he was doing, I'm sure he was only being nice, because the last thing the boys need is to suffer through your whiny, simpering, tits-to-the-ears attempts at flirtations. You can go away now."

"You're such a bitch!"

"I consider that a compliment! Shoo!"

Merlin glanced at Gwen, who smiled in amusement, and looked back at Morgana, who slid onto the vacated spots to make more room for Merlin and Gwen. "You're something amazing, aren't you? Terrifying, but amazing."

Morgana's surprise betrayed itself in the way that her expression softened, and she wrapped a hand around Merlin's arm, holding on for dear life.

"And why doesn't the man who knows the perfect thing to say have a girlfriend?"

Merlin coloured. "I don't know the perfect thing to say."

"Well, we can fix that," Morgana said, her voice the familiar -- and painful -- timbre of a resolute matchmaker. "I know several ladies who would adore you. I'll call them and invite them to the party tonight."

Merlin flinched. "Please don't."

Morgana raised an arched brow, but thankfully didn't speak, because Arthur had broken from the herd with the ball at his feet, and was racing for the opposing goal. He feinted, went left, darted right, and kicked hard, the ball shooting into the net a bare few centimetres from the goaltender's fingers. A good three-quarters of the bleachers stood up and cheered; the rest booed good-naturedly. Merlin sat back down, discovering that Morgana never let go of his arm. They watched the game in silence for a few more minutes.

"How come you aren't playing?" Gwen asked.

"Because while that lot over there spent all their productive teenage years playing footie, I was the bloke sitting on the bleachers shivering in the cold trying to keep my fingers warm while I did their homework," Merlin said. "I really wasn't much for sports."

"What are you much for?" Morgana asked. Her eyes were narrowed in speculation.

"Oh. Math, free Internet, and world peace," Merlin said, deliberately misunderstanding her. There was no missing that woman's tone. Inexplicably nervous, Merlin babbled on, "I also like long strolls on a lovely mountain hillside, counting the stars on a clear crisp night, and arguing with the local toffs to keep their graffiti off my car."

He paused. "Not that I have a car now. Got rid of most everything when I joined up, donated what I could to charity."

Morgana hit him on the arm. "This isn't a Miss World competition."

Abruptly, she sat up ramrod straight, studying him with a discomfiting look, and leaned past him to exchange glances with Gwen, matching them with furtively-raised eyebrows and those hand-gestures that women seemed to be so good at interpreting. Merlin tried to stare straight ahead, ignoring her, but he was equally busy trying to figure out those hand signals. He wondered if Arthur had learned them from her, or vice-versa -- Arthur's silent commands were completely incomprehensible, and Morgana's even more so.

"Merlin, are you --"

"So, the party tonight," Merlin interrupted, desperate to change the topic before Morgana asked a leading question that he wasn't ready to answer. "Do they always have parties?"

"Never mind the party. Merlin, do you like --"

"Not always. Just when they have a reason to have a party." It was Gwen who saved him by pulling his arm, and he turned to smile at her for the rescue. "This party's for you, you know. The way Lance tells it, everyone's best pleased, because the team's finally complete, and they think that's worth celebrating."

Merlin frowned. "Lance said that?"

Gwen said, her voice soft and gentle and fond, and her words made Merlin's heart skip a beat. " _Arthur_ said that."

 

  


**ooOOoo**  


 

The party had been a raging success, if the number of bodies littering Arthur's flat was any indication. He was glad that he'd asked Morgana to stash an extra supply of paracetamol -- he'd had a sneaking suspicion that the team were going to get themselves completely pissed at the first opportunity, and he hadn't been wrong.

As grateful as Arthur was for Morgana's unique party-planning abilities and for her forethought in some items that he'd forgotten to add to the list, he decided that it would be years before he forgave Morgana for inviting those _harpies_.

Spouses, girlfriends, close friends -- all had been invited, and Arthur's flat had rocked with music and excited laughter as people got reacquainted. It had been nice, lively, energetic, with friendly jibes and games, until the door knocked and Morgana went to answer it, proclaiming, "Those must be my friends!"

After a few minutes, Arthur had decided that not only were they not her friends -- he'd met all of Morgana's friends and knew all the staff at Pendragon Consulting -- but slags that she'd met _somewhere_ at some point in the last few months, and that she'd invited them in the hopes of... of...

He didn't know what Morgana thought she was doing, but one of those women had latched onto Arthur's arm and wouldn't let go for the entire evening, leaving Arthur to frantically search for salt or matches that he could use to get rid of the parasite digging her nails into his arm, like a leech trying to get to a prime spot to suck his blood. The other one had gone off to wrap herself around Merlin.

_Merlin!_

And Merlin had looked like he'd _enjoyed_ the attention. He'd laughed, told her stories, leaned close to her ear to talk when the music got loud, even tolerated the woman's random touches on his arm and cheek and shoulder. Arthur had spent more time watching Merlin with that... that... _harpy_! than he had talking to anyone else.

At one point in the evening, he had caught Morgana's smug look, and if it weren't for Leon, Arthur would have tossed her out on her arse.

Along with her two "friends".

It turned out that, according to Leon, they _were_ friends, or at least acquaintances that got together once in a while for drinks after work, but that they were also hunter-gatherer types, where one fancied herself married to the president and CEO of an important company and had her eyes set on becoming the future Mrs Pendragon -- though she'd best turn her energies to Uther for that to happen -- and the other had a weakness for men with more than two brain cells to rub together, and it was unfortunate that Merlin wasn't in that category after a few beers.

At about midnight, most of the crowd wandered out, leaving the team to themselves, but it had needed a goddamn _crowbar_ to pry the parasites from Arthur and from Merlin -- Arthur almost believed that the look Merlin had given him was one of grateful relief -- and to escort them out the door, with the fervent hope that they wouldn't turn up on his doorstep ever again.

The party had gone brilliantly after that. Except for one problem.

While Merlin was a lot more talkative when he was pissed, he didn't answer _questions_. He'd avoided them with the grace of a well-oiled pig running around the pen, talking on and on about everything and anything as long as it wasn't about himself. It hadn't mattered how much they plied him with alcohol in a clever attempt to get the man to talk about himself -- Merlin was tight-lipped.

Arthur's plan to get Merlin's life story had been completely derailed. It didn't matter, though.

He had other plans. He always did.

It was half-past Merlin-passed out by the time Lance had remarked, "He must have gone through counter-interrogation."

"Merlin?" Perceval had hiccupped, loudly and frequently, for the next few minutes, which had set off a round of laughter that had done absolutely nothing to wake Merlin.

God knew that they had tried. Arthur shook his head, wincing.

He'd had a bit too much to drink, too.

Arthur stepped over Leon, who was cradling a pillow in his arms and snuffling under a blanket. He nearly tripped over Gwaine, who'd decided to roll his sleeping bag under the table where empty boxes of pizza -- ordered somewhere at 2 AM when they discovered that they'd run out of food, even with Merlin's mum's baking. He made it to the kitchen, rinsed out his blender -- someone had used it to make margaritas -- and prepared his usual protein shake.

The sound of the blender went right to his skull and woke up Gwaine, Perceval and Leon.

"Oi! Do you _have_ to do that?" Leon groaned.

Galahad, on the other side of the living room, rolled onto his back and breathed out a deep, monstrous snore. Arthur chuckled, and it hurt his head.

"Do we have to get up?" Gwaine asked.

"No." Arthur sipped at the protein shake, testing his stomach. When it didn't roil too much, he drank some more. "Running's cancelled. Moved PT until noon. Morowitz at four."

Morowitz was the Krav Maga instructor that he'd engaged to keep them fighting fit when they were on R&R, a former Iraeli Mossad agent that he'd met through Olaf. Morowitz was absolutely brutal, and he wouldn't have any sympathy for those of them still hung over by the end of the day.

Leon breathed a pained "Oh. That's good."

There was a faint thump that could've been someone's head knocking back onto the floor. Arthur wasn't sure whose it was, but it made him wince in sympathy.

"If everyone's dressed and mobile in an hour, I'm buying breakfast," Arthur said.

"Cheers," Perceval said, and the sound of his own voice made him groan.

"Don't thank me yet. One of you has to wake Merlin."

"Not me," said Gwaine.

"Nor me," Leon put in.

There was a grunt from Owain that might have been "Not me, either", and a snore that was on the negative side, but it was Perceval who lifted a wobbly arm in the air and said, "I'll carry him if someone carries me."

Arthur finished his shake and leaned against the island, counting the number of bodies. Gwaine, Leon, Perceval and Galahad. Four. No, five -- he couldn't forget Owain, not with those big feet sticking out from behind the couch. Lancelot had gone home with Gwen, and everyone else had poured into a late-night taxi in the early hours of the morning.

Arthur stepped over Perceval and went to check on Merlin, glass of water and blister pack of paracetamol in hand. He knocked on the door, not really expecting any answer, and walked in with the confidence of someone who knew that Merlin wasn't anywhere near the near-naked and completely tantalizing state he'd been in the morning before.

Which was something of a pity.

When it became obvious that none of them had been able to wake Merlin for another round of Twenty Questions -- not that Merlin had been playing, not exactly -- Perceval threw Merlin over his shoulder in a fireman's carry and came back to the party a minute later, having effectively dumped Merlin on the bed, still fully clothed.

Merlin might still be fully clothed now, but there was a blanket thrown over his body, and his shirt was raised just a tiny little bit. He was all long limbs and pointy elbows with a pillow hugged over his head, holding it down in fragile defence against the deadly sunlight streaming through the windows.

Arthur was lucky that his head was in bits and that his stomach had chosen now to rebel against the semblance of sustenance he'd poured down his throat, or he was certain that his body would find some reason to find something undeniably attractive about the sight laid out before him. Which there wasn't.

Hardly at all.

He pinched the bridge of his nose, half against the dull ache from a slowly-receding throb, half to remind himself that a good chunk of Excalibur was in the other room, and that in none of his fantasies were they anywhere in the area when he was busily ravishing Merlin.

"Merlin."

Arthur put the glass of water and the paracetamol on the side table and sat down on the edge of the bed, pulling at the pillow. There was no give; Merlin wasn't letting go. "Merlin."

"G'way. 'S not here. 'S dead."

The muffled, slurred words came out framed in a pathetic, pained moan.

"Come on, Merlin," Arthur said, pulling on the pillow until it started to slip out of Merlin's arms. "Self-asphyxiation isn't the answer."

The pillow came loose, and those gangly limbs -- looking pale and fragile in the bright light of an early morning -- fell on top of Merlin's face instead, shielding his eyes. Arthur wanted to pick him up and pet him until he felt better.

"Water and painkillers on the side table," Arthur said, his voice gruff. "Take them, then do try to get out of bed. We'll have breakfast."

Merlin's arms unfolded, his face scrunched up against the light, and he found another pillow to press onto his face.

"It's your own fault, you know," Arthur said, hitting Merlin's leg, his hand lingering on a bony knee through the comforter.

"'S wh..Mm?" The strangled sound could have been anything from _How is it my fault, exactly_ , and _Go fuck yourself you bloody tosser_. Arthur smirked in amusement.

"You could've saved us the aggravation of getting you drunk to spill all your secrets," Arthur said, and never mind that it didn't work in the first place. "By telling us all your secrets from the get-go. Also, you've been in the army how long? And you can't hold your liquor?"

Merlin's arm lifted from the pillow and swatted in his direction, missing by about twenty centimetres.

Arthur whipped the second pillow from Merlin's face and a small twinge of guilt stabbed his belly at Merlin's soft, pained whine, but he tamped it down. "Breakfast, _Mer_ lin. In an hour. But only if you're dressed and mobile."

He got up from the bed and walked out, leaving the door wide open, and most definitely did not glance over his shoulder at Merlin.

* * *

In the end, Galahad pleaded _death warmed over_ and took a taxi home with a promise to be on time for PT, no matter how wrecked he was, and Lance showed up on the hour, cheerful, wide-awake, not suffering in the least from any over-indulgence, which made everyone else hate him by default. Between Lance and a hungry Perceval, they'd managed to haul Merlin out of bed and to walk him down the block to the family-owned fry-upu place that served an excellent hangover cure for breakfast, and it was a good thing that Merlin had gone to bed still fully-dressed, because they'd have never made the one-hour deadline otherwise.

"What y'all have?" the forty-something waitress asked in an ex-pat American accent while snapping gum obnoxiously loud, jotting down a list of food that amounted to _for pity's sake, just bring the kitchen out and put it right here in front of us_ and _strongest coffee you've got, and please inject directly into the vein_. Arthur ended up ordering for Merlin, because Merlin was elbows-on-the-table, trying to hold his head up and failing miserably.

"'M never drinking again," he promised, his words still slurred, but it was a toss-up whether it was a drunk-slur or a sleep-slur.

"Until next time," Leon said with a grin, the grin fading on one side of his face as he winced and put a hand against his temple.

"Won't be a next time," Merlin mumbled. "Hate you all. 'M quitting."

"Sorry, Merlin. You can't quit," Arthur said. "I'm not signing any more transfer papers."

"'M gonna forge your signature. 'S just a squiggle anyway," Merlin said. "'M gonna go AWOL. Something."

"If you run away, we'll hunt you down and bring you back, kicking and screaming," Perceval supplied.

Merlin sat back slowly, every inch gained accompanied with a shuddering groan, and he lowered his face as if every movement came with the fierce heat of a thousand miseries. He checked out his bare arms, lifted up the shoulders of his shirt, peeked down his front, and patted what he could of his own back with a double-jointed contortion of his elbows and wrists that made Arthur stare a little blankly.

"What are you looking for?" Lance asked.

"Tats," Merlin said, dropping his arms with what looked to be relief. "Dodged that one, didn't I?"

Everyone at the table exchanged glances. Despite looking as if his head was wrapped in cotton, Merlin noticed, and asked insistently, "Didn't I?"

"It's on your arse," Gwaine volunteered, pointing down. "Nice arse it is, too. Left cheek."

"Right cheek, actually," Owain said.

"I'm sure it's the left."

"You were as drunk as he was, and upside down besides," Owain pointed out. "Right cheek."

Merlin stood up like a shot, patting his arse with his hands, before half-twisting around to peek down his pants, and when that didn't work, he stuck his own hands down his jeans. All that happened just as the waitress returned with several cups and a carafe, and she watched Merlin with a raised brow while pouring the coffee, not spilling a single, precious drop.

"Lot of wankers you are," Merlin said, sitting down heavily to a round of chuckles when he didn't find any tattoos, and went back to cradling his head over the table, shifting the coffee so that he could breathe it in. "What did you go and do this to me for?"

"Did you want a tattoo?" Arthur asked. Every member of the team had at least one tattoo -- and that tattoo was a variation of the one that Arthur had gotten very early on in his military career. Where his was the family's heraldic dragon in black negative with the detailed outline of the sword, Excalibur, in the centre, mythical quotations and all, the whole thing in the shape of a shield on his left ribcage, most of the others had simply gotten a small sword with their own flourishes on them on other parts of their bodies. Merlin didn't have a tattoo of anything, as far has he'd seen.

And he'd looked.

There was no missing the furtive, half-hurt, half-shrug, or evasive, "I'm talking about the getting me pissed bit."

A quick glance around the table hinted that everyone was slightly too shattered to have noticed, but Arthur shared a brief look and raised eyebrow with Leon. After the talk on the front stoop of the Du Lac house, Arthur had gestured Leon aside and they'd spoken out in the yard, where it was at least somewhat quieter than the inside of the house, trying to figure out what they could do to make Merlin know that he was a member of the team, of the family.

He'd told Leon the story Will had told him of Merlin's near-court-martial. He'd left out most of the details and the veiled threats, and if there was anything that the two of them agreed on, it was that the aftermath couldn't have been easy for Merlin. Merlin tried to make it sound better than it was, because he'd said it had been his choice to join the Artists for a training post, rather than it not having been a choice at all, not when his former CO was still in active duty, no doubt spreading stories and rumours about Merlin. Arthur had done the math -- by the time that Merlin had gone through the tribunal, he would have been sufficiently recovered from his injuries to return to active duty.

He likely had, only to be greeted by squad after new squad of hostiles who didn't want him there because they believed rumours, gossip, speculation. How hard must it have been to be part of a team and not be part of a team? Arthur couldn't imagine.

Going to the Artists had been Merlin's only recourse -- no wonder all his transfer requests to return to active duty had been rejected. The Brass didn't know where to put him until Excalibur came along, desperate enough for anyone with Merlin's skills.

Arthur felt impossibly angry about it -- that instead of assigning Merlin to Excalibur the first time Merlin put in his transfer, the team had to suffer through a string of soldiers who were unsuited simpletons. Had the Brass really thought that Excalibur would bend under the weight of unfounded rumours, or listen to what some random pillock of a captain said? Gwaine had snooped the official records, spoken to Merlin's old squad, and talked to non-coms, but hadn't passed on any of the rumours and speculation -- he knew Arthur would put a stop to it because Arthur made up his own mind, and made up his mind he had. Arthur had gone through what he was authorized to see of Merlin's file, had done the Google searches, and had seen what Merlin was capable of with his own eyes.

He swallowed a sigh. He didn't know what to do to make Merlin see how much a part of the team he was. He could say it until he was blue in the face; he could pound it in the other man's head, but it wasn't sinking in.

"Well," Arthur said finally, "We've got questions, you've got secrets, and you don't answer them. You can't blame us for being curious."

"Still don't know how you did it, mate," Gwaine said. "Pissed out of my skull, I would've told anyone who listened everything that I did that night with this bloody gorgeous girl -- Patricia, I think she told me her name were --"

"No one's interested in that," Arthur said, his tone flat.

"Oi! Speak for yourself," Owain snorted. He leaned across the table and stole the coffee from under Merlin's nose. "So how'd you do it? Keep mum on everything short of us sticking bamboo sticks up your fingernails? You go through anti-interrogation?"

A desperate Merlin grabbed Arthur's empty cup of coffee and curled around it protectively, swallowing down the dregs as quickly as he could and coughing.

"Oh, ho, ho, I think we've found his weakness," Perceval said, reaching out to snatch the empty cup out of Merlin's hands. At once, everyone moved their coffee out of Merlin's grabby reach.

"You pillocks," Merlin said, his voice soft, as if anything louder would split his head in two. He stared at the table for a long moment in a show of resistance before shifting to sit up, but Arthur wrapped his arm around the back of his chair, trapping him against the wall. The biggest jewel-blue eyes turned on him, bright and brilliant and _accusing_ , and he hissed, "Yes, fine, you absolute, utter pillocks. Yes. I went through anti-interrogation. Happy?"

He reached for his coffee cup. Instead, Perceval poured a spoonful into an empty and offered it to him.

Merlin's face scrunched up with despair and frustration, and a small little whimper escaped his lips.

Lance leaned forward, grinning. "You told us a story last night about the time you went to Old Man Simmons' place and did something to his mill? You told us that you fell off the windmill and broke your leg. You know, I've seen your medical records and I don't remember seeing anything about you having had a broken bone? They should've shown up on your X-rays."

Merlin winced and said, "I'm made out of rubber."

Perceval poured the tablespoon of coffee from the empty cup back into the full cup, and Merlin whined.

"I made it up?"

Perceval shook out the last few drops.

Merlin covered his face with his hands. "It was a hairline fracture! My left leg, right above the ankle! Maybe it doesn't show up in X-rays because it was a long time ago?"

Lance shrugged his shoulders as if that was plausible, and Perceval added coffee to the empty cup.

Life and realization came to Gwaine's shattered senses, and he sat up straight. "So, boyfriend or girlfriend? Or both?"

Arthur glanced at Gwaine and back at Merlin.

"Neither," Merlin said finally, never uncovering his face from his hands. "I'm single."

"So, if you could have one or the other, which would you prefer?"

There was a moment, a slight, faint trickle of a moment, where Arthur's heart stopped beating and he could see Merlin trying to decide if the coffee really was worth it. Finally, Merlin lowered his hands, blinked against the bright lights, crossed his arms in front of him, and looked wearily at Gwaine.

"You're _still_ not my type," Merlin said, pale and tired.

Arthur's heart pounded, and he glanced between the two men, picking apart Merlin's answer, flaying it to an inch of its life, trying to divine meaning and significance.

"What type's that?" Owain asked. "Male?"

Merlin played with the knife and fork, rattling them on the linoleum surface, his shoulders stooped, his head down, and Arthur knew then. He _knew_. His heart pounded loudly in his ears, threatened to burst through his chest, and constricted his lungs, making it hard to breathe. He almost didn't hear Merlin's answer.

"Sorry, mate. You're a great bloke and all, and you've got that swashbuckler charm going for you, but you're a player. I'm done with that scene. Been done with it for a long time."

There was a quality to Merlin's voice -- _hurt, betrayal, pain_ \-- that brought Arthur's hand from the back of the chair to Merlin's shoulder, and he squeezed gently, hoping to give him some comfort. When he looked up, he saw Leon and Lance smirking into their cups, Perceval glancing between them with a knowing look, and Owain and Gwaine completely oblivious.

"Bad luck, Gwaine," Owain said.

Gwaine wasn't easy to dissuade and leaned toward Merlin from across the table. "Oh, come on. Give me a go at least once. I could change your mind."

The words were out of Arthur's mouth before he could stop them. "Leave him alone, Gwaine."

His voice was soft, with an edge of warning, and Gwaine looked at him with a sharp glance and a raised eyebrow, the tension edging upward until the waitress arrived and put down plate after loaded plate with loud clanks. Arthur drew back his hand with a glance toward Merlin, and it seemed to him that some of the weight that he'd been carrying on his shoulders eased and dissipated.

Merlin was gay.

Remembering that he was still Merlin's commanding officer, and that there were rules against relationships with subordinates -- it kept the wide grin of a kid who'd just received a lifetime's worth of Christmas presents from spreading across his face.

_Great._

What was Arthur going to do now? Transferring Merlin to another unit was out of the question. He couldn't do that to Merlin, not after everything he'd been through with his old unit. He couldn't do that to the team, who'd come to rely on Merlin. Arthur couldn't quit, either, because this was _his_ team.

He sighed inwardly. He was going to have to wait.

He was going to have to wait a damn long time. The realization struck him hard, because it mixed with the surprising knowledge that waiting for _Merlin_ would be worth it.

Beside him, Merlin leaned back to reach into his pocket, pulling out his phone. The last of the dishes were brought to the table, and the waitress returned with a fresh coffee carafe, refilling every cup. A sidelong glance in Merlin's direction, at the long length of him, at the milky skin, gorgeous lips, lickable throat, and Arthur knew that there would be a lot of long nights of sexual frustration and shower wanks in his future.

Merlin thumbed the unlock key to his phone and checked his messages. He stared at one message until the screen went blank, calling it back a minute later to text something back.

"Problem?" Leon asked, a bit of concern in his voice.

Arthur had been too wrapped up in himself to notice the pinched frown on Merlin's brow, the way he looked as if he'd completely lost his appetite for everything, even coffee.

"No, no. That was Will. He just texted me the number of someone we know. Turns out she's living in London, now."

"You should get in touch," Arthur suggested. Merlin glanced at him, an unreadable look on his face, and ducked his head, picking up his fork to cut up the egg whites of the Farmer's Special.

"Yeah, maybe I will," Merlin said, and he sounded as if he thought that was a terrible idea.

"Old flame, is it?" Gwaine asked.

Merlin laughed, but it was half-hearted. "Kind of."

* * *

Physical training had been half-hearted all the way around, but the boys put in their best effort. Even Arthur couldn't be arsed to push through the last sets -- he was completely, utterly knackered, though nowhere as badly as Merlin, who moved through the workout as if he were in a sleepy zombie daze. Everyone took pity on Merlin and left him to nap on the bench -- whichever bench happened to be nearest, waking him up when the group moved to a different area of the gym.

If there was one bright point in the PT, it was that the musclehead from the previous day hadn't been there.

While he waited for Merlin to drag himself out of the showers, Arthur made a phone call. "Mara, honey, it's Arthur? I know today's your day off, but I'm wondering if you could do me a favour and open your shop later tonight?"

"You want a new one, Arthur?"

"I can't imagine getting another one better than the one you did," Arthur said with a grin, nodding at Leon, who came outside next. "No, it's for a new squad member. He's overdue."

Leon grinned. "Taking Merlin to Mara?"

Arthur nodded. "Leon says hi."

"Oh, tell that delicious redhead if he ever wants to dump the hideous witch he's with, that I'll leave my husband in a heartbeat," Mara said, and he could hear her grin over the phone.

"No, you won't. For one thing, if Morgana hears that I facilitated it in _any_ way, she will turn me into hamburger. And then there's Raymond..."

Mara's husband was six and a half feet of solid brickworker muscle. Arthur didn't want to get in a fight with him without being completely enveloped in a Howitzer tank. Mara's laugh was infectious, and Arthur laughed.

"You know what? He's got a poker game tonight and if my choices of entertainment include going to my sister-in-law's to watch her brats tear up the house, going to a Tupperware party with my besties, or seeing this new boy of yours, you win by spades. I'll be at the shop at eight."

"Thanks, Mara," Arthur said, hanging up, and nodded to Leon. "It's set."

They waited for the rest of the team, and the shower seemed to refresh Merlin, because he was a little more awake when he followed Perceval out.

The gym nap and lunch at a takeaway deli had done wonders for Merlin, giving him a second wind that carried him through the Krav Maga martial arts training with Morowitz. By the time they were done their three hours, it was seven o'clock, and there was a free hour before he needed to take Merlin to see Mara. The others went home for the night with reminders that the following morning, they were back to their usual PT schedule.

Arthur took Merlin for a dinner that was a quick sit-down eat-and-run at an Italian restaurant, with Merlin asking, "So why are we in a hurry?"

"We're meeting a friend of mine in a bit. I hope you don't mind?"

Merlin looked a little crestfallen, and it was the sort of look Arthur couldn't figure out despite his catalogue of Merlin expressions. "You know, if you want to go see whoever it is, I can just take the tube back."

"Actually, the meeting's for you," Arthur said, taking a sip of his water. He'd thought of getting a beer, but figured that his liver could use the day off.

"Oh, God, no," Merlin said, leaning back in his seat and running frustrated hands through his hair. "This isn't someone you want me to meet because, you know, what I said this morning? It's bad enough Morgana tried to set me up with that woman..."

Merlin visibly shuddered, and continued, "... without you getting in on the matchmaking act."

Arthur snorted. As if he would hand-deliver Merlin to anyone who might hold onto him before the sticky complications keeping Arthur from making an attempt were out of the way. "Absolutely not. I don't do that sort of thing. Like I said, it's a friend. Besides, you said you liked boys."

"Yeah, so?" Merlin asked, frowning warily.

"Mara's a girl."

"Oh," Merlin said, and whatever had come over him earlier eased, because he tucked into his pasta. Arthur reached over and stole a shrimp from his bowl.

Arthur glanced around, but no one was nearby. "At some point we're going to have to talk about what we're going to do when we get back on active duty. You know, if we get recalled early and we don't have a plan..."

"A plan for what?" Merlin asked, spreading his hands suddenly, almost knocking over his glass of water. Arthur steadied it with a quick grab. "They did a whole lot of talking, but they didn't tell us anything. What are we planning for?"

"Round two," Arthur said. "You've already been through round one. What do you think we'll expect from a second go?"

Merlin glanced up furtively, spinning his fork through the spag-bowl, a muscle jumping in his jaw. The shadows cast the man's cheekbones in sharp relief, and the tuck of his chin toward his chest, keeping his eyes down, hid any visible emotion from his expression.

Arthur had not forgotten what Olaf Niedermann had told him, but he hadn't had much time to put real thought into it. _This isn't where I tell you that magic is real_ , Olaf had said, but when Olaf said anything at all, even a throwaway ridiculous concept like magic, Arthur knew that there was something to what he said.

Magic.

_Really?_

It didn't help that Excalibur had encountered their fair share of weird incidents in the past. That Arthur had been neatly hauled up by a dust storm in the Ravines and nearly eaten by a hallucination. Or that three of his team had, more recently, gone against the impossible -- an impossible that the Americans were very interested in.

Merlin was the only other member of the team with security clearance to even discuss their three potential targets, and he was one of the people who had witnessed the strange things first-hand with those same targets, but he didn't look willing to talk, and Arthur had a sneaking suspicion why -- he didn't want to sound as if he were downright strange himself.

There might not have been much in Merlin's file that Arthur had been cleared to see when Merlin first joined Excalibur, and it might have been a while since Arthur had looked at that file, but Arthur didn't forget anything. He'd noticed with a raised brow that Merlin had put down _Pagan_ as his religion.

If _Merlin_ had described the "weird things" as "magic", Arthur would have dismissed it out of hand. But he hadn't, and it had been _Olaf_ who dropped the word.

"Hey," Arthur said softly, waiting until Merlin looked up. When he did, it was with hesitant glance. "Whatever they're going to come at us with -- the weapons, tactics, whatever _else_ , however ridiculous or far-fetched, I want to be prepared for it."

"Ridiculous and far-fetched?"

"Yeah. The weird force field stuff, the thing that tossed you --" Arthur stopped.

A hooded wariness came over Merlin. "Are you making fun of me?"

"Sorry?"

"Look, it's obvious that the Americans didn't tell us everything. There were holes you could drive a lorry through." Merlin stopped.

"Yeah. And?"

"They were talking tech. You're talking weird stuff, Arthur." Merlin paused. "What am I supposed to think? You got a look at my record, right? You know what my denomination is? You think I don't know when someone's having me on?"

Arthur leaned back in his seat. "We're not thinking anything because we don't know shite, Merlin. Advanced weaponry, alien technology, something _whatever it is_. That's not the point. The point is, you've got the clearance, and you've seen what they can do. I need you to help me understand what it is so that we can plan this. You're the perfect person. You understand the science. You know about..."

He waved a hand in the air.

There was a word that hung between them and Arthur couldn't say it, but Merlin wouldn't say it either, so Arthur choked it out. "Magic."

Merlin shook his head. "Magic isn't real."

And somehow, Arthur didn't believe him. Merlin wasn't a good liar -- he had nervous smiles and revealing dimples, or he was Too Serious and didn't make eye contact, all of which he was doing right now. But he left it alone.

"We need more information," Arthur said. "That much is clear. I've already contacted a few people to see if any of them will pan out. Do you know anybody?"

Merlin rubbed his eyes with his forefinger and thumb before dropping his hand. "Yeah, maybe."

There was such finality in his voice that Arthur let the matter drop entirely -- at least for now. They finished their meal in silence, paid their bills, and went to the car, driving in silence for a few blocks before Arthur pulled up in front of Mara's tattoo shop, the Inkwell. Merlin was in too deep thought to notice where they were.

"Mara designed and did my tattoo. I thought, maybe, you'd like her to do yours," Arthur said quietly.

Merlin snapped out of whatever funk he was in, studying him with a frown, before looking up toward the shop.

When Merlin looked at Arthur again, it was with such a brilliant, brilliant smile, that Arthur knew he was a goner.

He'd wait forever for Merlin.

 

  


**ooOOoo**  


 

Between Arthur and Gaius, the two-week stint of R&R was going to kill him.

Over days that followed the party, Arthur had continued the training regime -- runs before the crack of dawn, physical training immediately after, and three hours of martial arts training every night from seven o'clock onwards. In between, Merlin took the tube to see Uncle Gaius, who set him up to practicing his magic from the old books in the workshop -- and when the workshop proved too fragile for some of the most dangerous spells, they drove his junker out of London to a small grove where the Beltane feasts and Solstice festivals usually took place.

He was always very tired at the end of the day, wandering into his room for a quick shower and an immediate crash on top of the bed, too exhausted to even wank in the magnificence that was Arthur. And every God and Spirit in creation knew how much Merlin wanted to at the very least release the _pressure_.

Just once.

_Please._

All the Gods and Spirits in creation were against him, though, because that morning, Merlin had gone to his bedroom's attached bath for a quick rinse in the shower and change after PT, grabbing his rucksack on his way out, because Gaius insisted on promptness, and the Tube never ran on time at this time of the day. He was rewarded with the gorgeous sight of Arthur emerging from his third-floor bedroom wearing a suit tailored to his frame, the fabric of his pleated trousers hugging his muscular thighs, his shirt flat and even on his stomach, the jacket draped over broad shoulders.

Merlin nearly tripped and fell down the front stairs.

"I have a board meeting," Arthur said, as if that explained everything -- and Merlin supposed it did, though it was quite unfair of Arthur to flaunt just how good he looked at right this moment, when Merlin hadn't been with someone in years, and hadn't had himself a good wank in weeks, if not months, and had yet to wrap his hand around his cock except to groan quietly in an aborted attempt to toss himself off because there was _yet another interruption_ that made him jerk back and cover himself up and _desperately_ think of something else but Arthur so that it wouldn't be so bloody obvious that he had a raging hard-on.

"Right," Merlin coughed. "Well. Have fun with that."

"Going to your Uncle's again?"

"What? Oh. Yeah." Merlin glanced at his watch. If he ran, he'd make the train. He grasped for the lie that he'd prepared in case Arthur asked. "I'm helping him with his business. He's having issues with some remote controls."

Arthur nodded, but Merlin could tell that he wasn't really listening, more focused on snapping the clasp of a ridiculously expensive watch that shone silver and gold in the morning light. "Try to be back earlier today. Don't think I haven't noticed that you've been avoiding me since Mara gave you your tat. We have to talk about this and start making plans."

"Yeah, okay," Merlin said, and he turned away just in time to see Arthur shoot him a speculative look that he didn't have time to wonder about, because now, he was really late, and running toward the tube, tapping his foot impatiently the whole ride over.

By the time he rounded the corner at a run and headed up the street toward Gaius' house, Gaius was loading the trunk of his car with a small contraption that looked positively medieval, and Merlin flinched inwardly, because if he were loading the car, it meant that they were going to the grove again instead of having a study session in the back room. He received the raised bushy white eyebrow when he came to a stop, shrugging his backpack from his shoulder to help him with the heaviest parts.

"Sorry. PT this morning ran late, and the train was slow," Merlin offered in explanation, and Gaius left him to load up the rest of the items while he went to the house to fetch a packed lunch. Gaius drove while Merlin skimmed through the e-version of the magic book he was studying now, full of words and spells that he'd learned once, a long time ago, but had forgotten since joining the army.

"What are we doing today?" Merlin looked up in time to see the exit; the car slowed down and took the shoulder before turning onto a dirt road that was surprisingly well maintained, with a slight wave in it to cradle car tires, and only a handful of potholes to rattle passengers.

" _You_ are working on your reflexes today, Merlin," Gaius said, slowing the car to less than snail's pace as they drove over a short track of potholes -- the only potholes in the road thus far -- and guided the car toward a small, willow-shrouded grove, bringing the car through the hanging branches to an open circle. Gaius turned off the engine, and tapped the eReader that he'd given Merlin.

"I've spoken with Adam," Gaius said, speaking with the weight of someone who had been in deep discussion, "And we agree that, when it comes to magical battle, there is very little time to cast spells. Experienced sorcerers can prepare ahead of time -- and must do, if they intend to walk off the field alive. They do it by planning out their tactics, by half-casting spells ahead of time so that a single word will complete them, by training themselves to see five, ten, twenty moves ahead of their opponent."

"Like chess," Merlin said, turning off the e-reader and shoving it in his backpack. He suppressed a scowl; he hated chess. He'd never been very good at it, but Sunday nights growing up had been dedicated to a game with Gaius.

"Exactly like chess," Gaius said, getting out of the car. Merlin helped him unload the equipment from the back.

"Having the expertise to use your magic in battle isn't something that I would want for you, my boy, but if what you have told me is true, and I suspect it is, it will be absolutely necessary. However, using spells alone to plan for a battle when you don't know your opponent's skills or abilities is a dangerous endeavour. Adam -- you do remember Adam?"

Adam Campbell was one of Gaius' friends, a war veteran who had been at the forefront of the Allied battle against Germany. He was also a sorcerer in his own right, using both magic and bullets against the enemy, and Merlin supposed that he would be the right person to talk to about battlefield magic.

"I remember him. Didn't he yell at me for wrecking his garden, once?"

"You wrecked his garden more than once," Gaius said, raising that eyebrow again. "In any case, he insisted that spells learned on an _instinctive_ level would be ideal in battle conditions. We are fortunate that you have a potent memory, but we cannot rely on memory alone. Lucky for you, I have realized that you have an advantage over other sorcerers."

"What's that?" Merlin asked, assembling the monstrosity as Gaius instructed, and realized with horror that it was starting to look like one of those automatic tennis-ball chuckers.

"You don't need spells." Gaius patted his shoulder. "Go stand at the other end. We'll start with your shields, move on to deflection, then to destruction and carnage."

Merlin grinned. "Carnage, huh?"

"Which comes to you all too easily, I realize," Gaius said, his voice disapproving and fond. "I thought that I would start you off easy. Once you're properly warmed up, we'll see how we can improve your ability to absorb spells."

He dumped a large basket of tennis balls into the basin, aimed the arm, and flicked on the switch.

* * *

Merlin was bruised, battered, and a little bit bloodied. He should have known that Gaius would have rigged that tennis ball chucker to speeds above and beyond what was humanely possible. Too many of those tennis balls -- later replaced with one-pounder stainless steel balls -- had gotten through Merlin's defences.

At least in the beginning. He got the knack of it -- he used to have the knack, once upon a time, before he joined the army and it became even more important that he hide his abilities. Now that he wasn't suppressing his magic, his magic answered his will easily and without effort, lashing out, surging forward, blocking, defending, stealing energy and making its own. The first few spells that Gaius had sent at him had _stung_ like bloody hell, but his magic retaliated, absorbing the magic, turning it into something else and counter-attacking, focusing the power on the cardboard cut-outs that Gaius had liberally peppered around the grove.

The instant that he realized that he could do this, that he could use his magic in battle, Merlin had relaxed, elated, and in that instant, everything got that much _easier_.

But with that came a whole slew of new problems. If it was easier, if he could operate on instinct, it would be that much harder to resist using his magic in situations that didn't warrant it.

_Bollocks._

Merlin thought about it on the drive back to Gaius' house, but it wasn't until they were inside that Merlin said, "All right, so, that was good, yeah? But what do I do to keep from getting caught using it when I'm not supposed to?"

"Merlin," Gaius said, shaking his head sadly, "I don't know. All I can do is to ask you, _again_ , to be careful. You will remember to do that?"

Merlin gave Gaius a wry, uncertain grin, and headed to the shower. He'd need to wash up before he was presentable for the Tube. He didn't think that the usual British aplomb, coupled with the Underground's blinders-stare, would keep them from noticing that he was a whole lot on the bloodied side. At least he had a change of clothes.

And, at least, he'd been super careful to protect his new tattoo.

He showered quickly. He was in a hurry. He had to laugh -- this was R&R, and he always seemed to be on the go. Wasn't he supposed to be _resting_ and _recreating_?

Merlin hadn't shown anybody the tattoo yet, nobody except Gaius. Merlin went to extraordinary measures to keep it covered up during the early morning runs, the physical training, even during Krav Maga when Gwaine seemed desperate to get a sneak peak.

The truth was, the tattoo had healed in a little over a day because Merlin wanted it healed to keep the colours bright. Mara had done beautiful work. The detail was gorgeous.

It was of a dragon made up of Celtic knots, gold and greens and translucent blues wrapped around Excalibur. He hadn't wanted any other sword. Perceval had a claymore, but that fit him -- he was a giant of a man, and he needed a big sword. Gwaine had a longsword. Owain had an executioner's sword. Lance had a broadsword. Mara had shown him a book with pictures and descriptions, but Merlin had asked, "Did you do Arthur's sword?"

"I did," she'd said. "The sword, the shield, the dragon. It's all my work, but it's what Arthur wanted."

"Can you do the exact same one? The sword, I mean?"

"You don't want a sword that suits you more?"

Merlin had grinned, and said, "Come on. My name's Merlin. What's a more perfect sword than Excalibur?"

Mara had smiled at him, touched his cheek, and said, "Then, Excalibur, it is."

Merlin touched the edges of the tattoo on his left ribcage tenderly. It was in the same spot as Arthur's, too. He hadn't done it on purpose, either. When Mara had asked him where he wanted it, Merlin had thought about it for a moment, closing his eyes to _feel_ for the right spot, and his magic had guided his hand to point without even thinking about it.

He had her hide some symbols in the Celtic knots, too, darkening them out a little bolder than the rest. Now that it was healed, he could feel the magic pulse on each of those symbols, spells ready to be taken and thrown. They would come in useful, he knew, if they were ever going to go against Aredian and the Jester and Mordred again.

Gaius had nodded in approval when he saw them.

Merlin ran the towel through his damp hair and tried to make it presentable. He dressed quickly, shoved his belongings into his pack, and rushed down the stairs. He'd promised Arthur that he would make it back earlier, and at this rate, he was going to be late.

"Sorry, Uncle Gaius. I have to run."

"Merlin," Gaius said. "You're not staying for dinner?"

"Not this time. I'm supposed to meet Arthur."

At Gaius' concerned look, Merlin smiled.

"I'll be careful. I promise," Merlin said, and he was out the door, running for the train.

Between running in the morning, running for the train to get to Uncle Gaius, and running for the train to get back, Merlin's running shoes were running out of mileage, and he was operating on perpetual fumes. He was starving.

He got on the train and texted Arthur.

_U fancy takeaway? Ill pick up on way back._

An answer was almost immediate.

_Thai._

_Fish N chips._ Merlin texted back.

_Thai._

_Im not making 2 stops. Plus, starving. Not enough Thai in the world to shut up grumbling stomach._

There was a long pause -- Merlin changed stops -- before Arthur answered. _Just come home. Ive got delivery. Thai with side of fish N chips._

Merlin grinned, his stomach fluttering unexpectedly, his eyes going over and over the text before he realized what it was that had plastered a smile on his face. Arthur had told him to come "home".

Gods, what he wouldn't wish for that to be true -- and reminded himself, with a thump on his head with his fist, that even if Arthur swung his way, Arthur was still his commanding officer, and there were _rules_. Arthur was one for following the rules. Merlin sighed heavily and slumped in a free seat, running through the messages he'd gotten -- mostly from Will, complaining about his latest class of students, two from Gwaine organizing a movie night on Saturday, when the Sunday morning run would be cancelled in favour of a skydiving trip Arthur was planning -- while he was training with Gaius.

He came across the message from Will with Freya's phone number. Merlin sighed.

Calling Freya wasn't an option, but it was the only option he had if he wanted to get information on the new world order -- information that he needed to get if he was going to prove himself useful to Arthur. But Freya...

He could hear Will's voice telling him, "Be a man."

Merlin rolled his eyes, and dialled the number.

It rang twice. Three times. Four -- he was ready to hang up and call it a day when the line answered with a wary "Hello?"

"Is this Freya?"

"Who's calling?" The voice was defensive, ready to hang up.

"It's Merlin. Merlin Emrys. I'm a friend of hers from Wales. We went to school together. I got this number from Will --"

"Merlin. It's me. It's Freya." Quiet, shy, a little bit afraid, Freya sounded both happy and uncertain to hear him.

"Hi, Freya," Merlin said, smiling into the phone, and the woman seated across from him, hair so white it was almost blue, perked an eyebrow at him and smiled encouragingly, as if she were playing matchmaker, and she were his mum at his elbows, encouraging him to call the girl next door. "How are you? It's been a while, hasn't it?"

"I'm all right," Freya said quietly, "Why are you calling, Merlin?"

"Well, I..." Merlin glanced around. "I'm in London, staying with a friend. I've been out of the country for a bit, and, well, I was telling Will that I haven't been in touch with people from school... He said he'd put me in touch with... And, well, here I am. I'm wondering, if, maybe, you wanted to get together, maybe for coffee?"

There was a long silence, dragging out from one train stop to the next, and more than once, Merlin checked his phone to make sure that the connection hadn't dropped, which was impossible since he'd tweaked the phone. "Freya? Are you still there?"

"Yeah," she said. And after a long pause, she added, "I guess we could meet. Maybe tomorrow? For lunch?"

"That would be brilliant. I could come to you," Merlin said. "Where would you --"

"I'll text you where," Freya said, hurriedly, hastily, and abruptly, she hung up.

Merlin stared at the phone for a while, frowning in concern, and snapped it shut.

His magic roiled in his belly, giving him something like heartburn. He had a bad feeling about this.

* * *

The takeaway had beaten Merlin to the flat, and Arthur was at the dining table, his laptop open, reading something on the screen and taking notes. He'd barely touched his food, which was still steaming, and there were containers of Thai food all over the kitchen counter with more than enough food for a family of six, but the fish and chips were still in their package on a plate at the table next to Arthur. Merlin slid into the seat, thinking that it was very domestic and comfortable.

Too domestic and comfortable.

He swallowed a sigh. He wanted this, he really did. When he'd told Gwaine that he rally wasn't his type, that he was done with playing the field, he'd meant every word. Merlin had learned the hard way that one-night pulls were too dissatisfying, leaving him craving for more, and the short-term flings wrecked him seven sorts of ways because he _hoped_ for more.

And this -- sitting at the table for dinner with someone... It felt nice. Really nice. However temporary it was. R&R would be over in a week unless they were called back, and after that? Merlin didn't expect that Arthur would invite him to stay over again, so he clung to the moment for as long as he could.

"Cheers for this," Merlin said, dumping the chips on his plate. Arthur nodded absentmindedly, his brows furrowed in a frown.

"So, I was thinking," Arthur said, starting the conversation as if Merlin had been there all along, "If the Americans are on this, then our boys are probably, too, so that means there might be a file on Aredian and the others."

"Probably right," Merlin said in-between bites.

"MI-5 and whatever other branch of HMS are looking into them. They're not the sort to be caught with their pants down -- at least not all the way down. So why aren't they throwing loud conniptions about the CIA using Excalibur to track them down?"

Merlin stopped chewing and looked at Arthur. Arthur's sky-blue eyes, crisp and clear, were full of questions and indescribable emotion. Merlin knew that look -- he spent enough time watching Arthur to puzzle out most of his expressions. It was the look he had when he was about to take advantage of something. Or someone.

Did Arthur know that Merlin would do anything for him?

He didn't know how or when he started to feel this way. Maybe it was from the very first instant they met in the supply tent on the base, so full of passion, protective of men and women that he hadn't ever met and raging over substandard equipment -- equipment that people relied on to survive. Maybe it was in the Ravines when Merlin saw him reach out to the dust devil, thinking it was a woman who needed help, and willing to sacrifice himself to help it. Maybe it was during the war game when Arthur put himself out there, at the invisible, at the unseen, at the impossible, advancing with the absolute, unshakable faith that he would prevail.

Men like Arthur were men of legend. There was a terrible, irresistible pull toward him that Merlin couldn't resist. That he didn't want to resist.

"Maybe they are," Merlin said, unable to break eye contact. It wasn't until Arthur turned his laptop toward Merlin that Merlin could tear his attention away. There was an Unix screen open, the prompt blinking back.

"I'm glad you agree, _Mer_ lin." Arthur tapped a few keys on the laptop, and the backlight of the screen faded from bright to dark as a different program loaded.

"I don't know MI-5," Merlin protested sullenly. "Just what's on the Bond vids. All the crack work I did, it was through the Think Tank up in Wales, and the most of them I'd seen was their backsides when they grabbed the gear and left without so much as a _thanks, mate_. How am I supposed to know what they're doing? Do they even throw conniptions?"

A small smile curled on Arthur's lips. "If they're out of the loop, they do. Rather spectacular ones."

"So, are they out of the loop? With the Americans, I mean?"

Merlin could see Arthur thinking, his gaze distant. When he finally spoke, his body shifted in his seat, and he made ever-brief eye contact before stabbing a few bits from his plate. "They know what's going on. I don't think they'll be happy if they lose out on Aredian and the others."

There was something that Arthur wasn't saying, and Merlin prodded. "Which puts us in the crossfire between the CIA and MI-5."

Arthur glanced up and stared at Merlin for a long time, putting down his fork, and rubbed his face with the frustration of a man between a rock and a hard place. He wanted to protect his men from any blowback that would result from CIA interference -- blowback that was sure to occur if Excalibur captured any of the targets and merrily handed them over to the Americans. Merlin resisted the urge to reach over and comfort him, and instead waited until Arthur dropped his hands.

"Can you --" Arthur pointed at the computer and raised a meaningful brow.

Merlin took another look at the UNIX screen, reaching over to tap a couple of commands, and saw that Arthur had been trying to open a large, encrypted file.

"I received that from a friend of mine," Arthur said, not bothering with details. He picked up his fork and speared a spicy chicken bit from a dark brown sauce smothering red peppers and something yellow. "Might be important."

Merlin glanced from the computer to Arthur. "Mind if I eat first?"

"Well. You do look as if you're wasting away. I suppose I could make an exception this once." Arthur waved a magnanimous hand in Merlin's direction.

Merlin rolled his eyes. "So very kind and generous of you, _Sire_."

* * *

Merlin didn't decrypt the file right away. He took one look at the raw programming, recognized the level of code, and proceeded to do _things_ to Arthur's laptop to increase the security of the hardware, right down to stripping some of the programming code of the operating system with something a little bit more customized and an entire dimension more difficult to crack.

In between, they went for rounds of Krav Maga where Merlin decided that he really didn't like that little bugger, Morowitz -- it was almost as if the smaller man was picking on Merlin, and the reassurance from Leon, "No, mate, he's just trying to make you as strong as the rest of us", didn't make Merlin feel any better.

He'd almost recovered feeling in his left arm by the time Arthur drove them back to the flat, and when he finally lifted his head from the programming to announce that he'd completed the modifications to the laptop, he saw the telly was still on, playing a late night rerun of one of the Star Wars prequels (the worst one, in Merlin's estimation), but that Arthur was nowhere in sight. Merlin got up, stretched, and wandered around the flat, checking to make sure that Arthur wasn't in his the back room in his own private gym (because he could be fanatical about staying in shape) before heading up the stairs to the master bedroom.

"Arthur?"

He could hear another telly on, the volume turned on low, the sound of water running in the sink, and a bit of splashing that sounded like Arthur brushing his teeth. The door to the suite -- because the master bedroom wasn't a bedroom, it was a bloody _suite_ , with a ridiculously large bed, a full bathroom that included not only a hot tub and a massive shower, a walk-in closet, and a small kitchenette with a mini refrigerator for beer and snacks and a miniature coffee maker, ensuring that Arthur would never have to leave his bedroom even in the event of an apocalypse -- was ajar, and the lights flickered in time with the action and the music on the telly.

Merlin pushed the door open. "Ar--"

The rest of Arthur's name died in his throat.

Arthur was in the bathroom, leaning over the sink, wiping his mouth of toothpaste and putting his toothbrush away -- and he was naked.

Completely, to-the-day-he-was-born naked.

Merlin's cock went from zero to diamond hardness on the Mohs scale in less than a nanosecond, sucking up all the blood from Merlin's body, rendering him incapable of rational thought. For a precious moment, he was numb to the fact that he _ached_ all over, that his cock threatened to tear a hole through his jeans, and he almost, _almost_ pushed the door all the way in so that he could walk over to Arthur and --

\-- run gentle fingers over every square inch of that gorgeously-sculpted body --

\-- press kisses down the curve of that golden spine and back up again, nestling and nuzzling into that tuft of soft, delicious throat --

\-- kneel down in front of him and _worship_ in celebration of the man's perfection...

Merlin blinked, swallowing. He palmed himself, trying to adjust the pressure of his jeans. In the room, Arthur whipped a white towel from the bathroom counter and used it to sop up the moisture of his hair, heading into the bedroom. He picked up the television remote and changed the channel, flicking through the menu guide until he found the news channel.

 _Bloody hell._ Merlin knew could have a wank right here and now and not get caught. Maybe. He couldn't risk it, so he cast a hasty spell to mute his descent down the stairs, quickly jotted down a note that he'd "crack the code tomorrow", turned off the lights and the living room telly, and locked himself into the guest room.

He couldn't take it anymore.

Merlin leaned back against the shut door, groaning as he tore open the fly of his jeans, shoved down his boxers enough to free himself, taking his cock in hand roughly, dry, the need and the desire so hot and searing that it sent him to his knees, just as he'd imagined himself doing minutes earlier, except he wished desperately to be in front of Arthur now, because it could _only_ be Arthur --

_Oh, Gods!_

What Merlin wouldn't do to bury his face in Arthur's private scent, to run his tongue up the smooth flesh of Arthur's cock, to lick and mouth at his balls. To taste the salty pre-cum, to taste _Arthur_ , to take him into his mouth bit by precious bit until he could feel Arthur in the back of his throat. To have Arthur's strong hands run through his hair and hold him in place, leaving Merlin to his mercy as Arthur's hips hitched a rhythm, slow and sure at first, then deeper and faster as Arthur _fucked his mouth_ \--

The orgasm hit him with a rush of shuddering breath that whispered out "Arthur", and Merlin caught himself on one arm, shaky and as wobbly-legged as if he'd been fucked for real. He stayed like that for some time, on his knees, barely holding himself up on one arm, his free hand still stroking himself as the rest of his cum pulsed onto the wood floor.

Merlin had been fooling himself if he thought he'd be able to make it for the full two weeks of R&R _this_ close to Arthur.

He rolled onto his side, onto his back, and stared up at the ceiling.

* * *

The morning was its usual round of running, physical training, and breakfast, with the added spice of not being quite able to make eye contact with Arthur and the fortunate excuse of _'M trying to concentrate_ of cracking the very obvious high-level MI-5 encryption. At about half-eleven, his cell phone buzzed with a text from Freya, and Merlin left Arthur to puzzle out the contents of the decrypted file while he walked to the Underground, took the train two stops, and walked a maze of streets -- getting lost once until the GPS on his phone set him straight -- before he found Lord's Pizzeria.

It was a pit of age-worn linoleum tables, cracked rubber chairs, white-and-red checkerboard paper tablecloths and flimsy paper napkins that never came out of the napkin holder in one piece, with a couple of overhead fans that swirled about in a lazy swirl that had more to do with the draft coming through the windows than it did of actual powered energy. A heat blast from the open ovens nearly burned off his eyebrows, the constant yelling between the matron behind the till and the big man in the kitchen nearly burst his eardrums, and the overpowering stench of roasted garlic and aged parmesan killed his sense of smell. He blinked through the oily haze and thought he was the first one there when he spotted Freya.

The years hadn't been kind to Freya, and Merlin fought hard to keep the wince from his face. She'd been a pretty girl with mousy brown hair and eyes as dark as the fine baking chocolate his Mum kept for the special chocolate cookies that she only made for guests, but now, the mousy brown hair was stringy and dry, and the baking chocolate was grey with age and mould. Freya had always been slim and starved, but now, she was skinny and gaunt in a pretty maroon dress that was a size too big for her.

Merlin didn't think that he'd changed that much since he'd known Freya, but she stared through him without recognizing him until he came closer.

"Hey Freya," he said, smiling, but the smile came easy, because he was at least glad to see that she was alive, even if she weren't better than she'd been when he'd known her.

Her smile was small and fleeting, and the hollow in her eyes never cleared up. "Hi, Merlin."

She slid out of the booth and gave him an awkward hug, and he could feel that she was all skin and bones. They sat down to a stretched silence before the screechy Italian woman came over, still waving her hands in the air at the man in the kitchen, and took their order -- a fizzy lemon soda and cheese slice for Freya, a coke and a loaded vegetarian with extra pineapple for Merlin. After several minutes of stilted _how are you, you look good, how have you been_ conversation, they paused to take a couple of bites of a pizza that was surprisingly tasty considering the restaurant.

"This isn't bad," Merlin said.

"I come here all the time," Freya said, and something of her old smile returned. The tension in her shoulders relaxed, and she said, "How long are you in town?"

"Just another week, then I'm moving on." Merlin wasn't sure what prompted him to add, "I'm kind of couch-surfing at the moment."

"You? You're a couch-surfer?" Freya stared at him with eyes so wide, they were suddenly more white than brown, and after a moment, she barked a short, amused laugh. "Seriously? You? The golden boy? I mean, you studied, aced your A-levels, went to uni... What happened?"

"Oh, I..." Merlin shrugged, trying to wipe greasy, tomato-covered fingers with the flimsy, ripped-up excuse of a paper napkin. "It didn't work out, I guess. You know how it is. It's okay, though. I've been all over, mostly on the other side of the tunnel in Europe, a while in Thailand, even down to Australia."

Merlin wasn't lying -- not really. It was a bit out of context, but he'd visited all those places either during the breaks in uni, or on R&R from the army. He had a feeling he shouldn't tell her anything about being SAS.

"How about you? What have you been doing? Are you still with..." He saw Freya stiffen, but the words were out of her mouth before he could shut up. "Bryn?"

Her shoulders slumped, her chin went down, her arms tucking under the table. Her answer was almost too soft to be heard over the kitchen clatter. "Yeah."

"He's being good to you?" Merlin asked, leaning forward a bit.

Freya looked up at him with a defiant set of her shoulders, sitting up straight, looking him in the eye in a _what are you going to do about it_ glare. "He's been good to me."

Merlin smiled weakly. He didn't miss the implication of her words. He'd had his chance to take care of her, and he had taken care of her. He'd kept her secret, kept her safe, tried to teach her control, but Freya wanted more than he could give. When Bryn started to show interest in Freya, she'd played all the games she could, using Merlin, breaking his heart, dumping him for Bryn.

Bryn, the same schoolyard bully who'd nearly killed him. It had taken months of Will hammering it in his head that Freya had made her choice before Merlin quit feeling guilty. He still felt guilty.

"I'm glad," Merlin said through grit teeth, and Freya believed he was sincere if her big smile was anything to go by. Merlin didn't know how long he could keep up the lie, but he'd hold it as long as he could if it meant that he could get some information about the new world order for Arthur.

"You really don't have anything?" Freya asked.

"Nah," Merlin said, shaking his head.

Freya narrowed her eyes and tilted her chin up, considering. "What are you doing later tonight?"

 

  


**ooOOoo**  


 

Merlin's early-morning twitchiness and backwards "I'll be back later" were quickly forgotten the more Arthur studied the file that Olaf Niedermann sent him. If he hadn't expected Olaf to send him something in the first place, it would have been buried in his spam folder, because the email address had been wiped and the electronic trail nonexistent. The file, however, came with a suggestive subject line, a gigabyte-size, and the unforgivable frustration of being unreadable.

Thank God for Merlin.

The files on Jonathan Aredian and Samuel Trickler -- also known as the Jester -- contained the same standard information that had been summarized by both the Americans and by Olaf. There were more details, a psychological profile based on their behaviour and movements, a long list of people who had the misfortune of associating with them, known and suspected buyers and known sellers, and a myriad of other bits and pieces of information that Arthur memorized only because he half-expected the file to self-destruct on its own once he reached the end of the document, no matter how many security protocols and customized programming that Merlin had put on the laptop.

That was why he read everything carefully, instead of skimming the contents. It was why he studied every photograph and every image and every map. Why he watched the video clips over and over again. There was even footage -- grainy and distorted but obviously unedited -- of an encounter of the American Special Forces soldiers with Aredian and several other men, giving Arthur a better visual of the weird stuff that his own men had gone through.

He'd watched that clip several times.

On Mordred ap Aneurin, there was nothing but a slim, useless dossier. MI-5 agent or analyst or even recruited policemen who didn't know who they were really investigating for had done the rounds, collecting interviews from everyone who had known Mordred.

It all came down to one single sentiment.

_"He was such a sweet, quiet boy. Kept to himself a lot. Never got in trouble, that one. Sure, the schoolyard bullies picked on him and the pretty girls made fun of him, but he never paid them no never mind. He handed in his schoolwork on time, studied hard, did everything that his teachers asked of him. He was meant to go to uni --"_

Arthur filled in the rest of the thought with, _and then one morning, he flipped the switch from everyone's favourite kid and became a psychopathic weapons designer that every superpower in the world seems to want dead or alive, depending on what they wanted from him._

When he reached the end of the document and nothing happened -- it didn't suddenly disappear from his hard drive, his laptop didn't start making strange noise, and no assault gear-wearing secret agents burst into the flat to re-appropriate the illegal file -- Arthur went back to sections of the document that he felt needed a second look.

He was reviewing the weird CIA video when he noticed, and not for the first time, that it originated from a division of Her Majesty's Service that he didn't recognize, the logo unusual. It was a crown with a larger than normal center stone in the middle, a sceptre through the middle, and a single symbol at the bottom that looked like a rune.

_Directory of Alternate Affairs._

Arthur stared at it for a minute. He zoomed in as much as he could for a better look.

Alternate Affairs. Not Foreign Affairs. Not Domestic Affairs. And _Directory_ , rather than Division. Department. Ministry.

It was odd.

The CIA video was the only object in the dossier that was stamped with that logo, making Arthur wonder what the Directory had to do with the investigation and how it was that Olaf had obtained a file that contained detailed evidence from a section of the government Arthur had never heard of before.

His cell phone rang. Arthur reached blindly and found it on the second ear, pressing the receiver to his ear.

"Arthur Pendragon."

There was a bit of a background noise over the earpiece, like a lorry passing by, several automobiles honking at each other, and the hush of someone taking a leisurely pause near a quiet part of an unidentifiable city street.

"Midnight at the Lockout. Wear something suitable for clubbing, preferably low-key, meant to fit in and not attract too much attention," a male voice said. There were hints of an Irish accent, but it didn't belong to anyone Arthur recognized.

He leaned back in his chair. "Who is this?"

"My name is Edwin Muirden, Mister Pendragon. I believe we have a mutual friend."

Arthur glanced at the laptop screen and nodded, keeping his voice neutral. "I believe we do. Dress for clubbing. Anything else?"

"No guns. It would be foolish and pointless. I will assure your safety."

"You'll forgive me if I don't hold you in enough regard to take you to your word," Arthur said, switching the cell phone from one ear to the other, leaning forward to squint at something on the screen of his laptop. It was the faintest contrast of colours. He ran his mouse over it, and clicked.

A new document he hadn't seen before blinked open. It was another video, but he didn't hit the play icon just yet.

There was soft laughter over the line, full and rich and just this side shy of mocking. "A bit posh, aren't you? Our mutual friend did warn me that you knew how to play the game. We'll see how well you do. Midnight, Mister Pendragon."

The line disconnected with the faint plastic-on-metal click of a receiver on a hook in an outdoor phone booth. Arthur stared at his phone for a moment, half-wishing that Merlin hadn't gone off to his Uncle's or wherever it was that he'd gone off to, to see if Merlin could track down the phone number's location so that he could at least have an idea of the area he'd be heading into, though he suspected that this Edwin had probably gone out of his way to use a blind phone booth to make the call so that he wouldn't be tracked.

Arthur stared at the phone for some time before putting it aside.

At the very least, Olaf was coming through on his debt by putting him in touch with the people who had the information he was looking for. The file was useful, but there was too much missing. There had to be more than only three people. This master ring couldn't be limited to Aredian, the Jester, and Mordred -- surely, others were involved, too.

Arthur suspected that Olaf had limited the file to what Arthur had asked for, and no more. The dossier was sadly lacking on the whole new world order angle, but that was what Edwin Muirden was for. Which reminded him --

He clicked the play icon on the video clip.

The footage was moving, as if it was coming from amateur video, the camera somewhere near the person's shoulder, or maybe even in their tie, if it was a bit of secret spy technology. The person was moving through a crowd of people at a party, some people subdued and relaxed, other people jumping up manically and throwing their arms around in time to some music that wasn't audible over the camera. Every now and then, the camera paused in front of someone, and the two of them would chat. Subtitles appeared in a box beneath the video clip.

_Cicero! How ya doin'._

_Good, good. You seen Buddy?_

_He's over in the back -- there's sumthin' goin' on. A private show or sumthin'. I dunno what, they brought in this guy. Tried to get in, but they kicked me out. Kicked out Ronnie, too._

The person moved on and accosted a different person, a pretty woman with long blond hair and dark eyebrows, the sort of match of colour that only happened when someone hit the bleach hard.

_Veronica. Is Buddy around?_

_Your American friend?_

_How many people named Buddy do you know?_

_He's in the back,_ Veronica -- Ronnie -- said, scowling as if some great offence had been made against her person. _He threw me out, Cice. It's my party, and he threw me out!_

_It's all right, it's all right. Take it easy. I'll go see what he's up to, make him apologize._

Again, the person was on the move, heading further and further through what Arthur could see was a very large house with art nouveau strategically placed everywhere, expensive furniture shoved as far back as the walls would allow to give as many people as possible room to stand around and chat. A group of five people were kneeling in front of a mirrored coffee table, using the surface to cut and distribute coke lines that were snorted through colourful rolled up Euro bills.

A minute passed before the camera reached a closed door. He tried the handle, but it was locked. Finally, he banged on it and an eyeball appeared in the crack, but whoever it was, they were satisfied that it was only "Cicero", and opened the door wider, pulling him inside and shutting the door behind him.

_Buddy, what the fuck? Ronnie's pissed._

_She'll get over it,_ said the other man, an older, in-his-fifties-but-looked-ten-years-younger man with wild dark blond hair streaked with pure white. _Come on. You have to see this._

There was a small group of people in the back room -- no more than fifteen, maybe twenty people. They each had a drink in their hand -- beer bottles or beer cans or glasses of some foul-looking mixture in absinthe green or bog water yellow; at least four of them were smoking joints and passing it around to the others, and the cloud of cigarette smoke was so thick, "Cicero" waved his hand in front of his face to get to wherever it was that "Buddy" was going.

There was a man in the middle of the circle, his arm draped over a young girl's shoulders. She was barely legal, thin and willowy in a way that girls were thin and willowy now, with just enough curve in all the right places to be attractive to the people who had a certain type. Her hair was tied back in a pretty ponytail, her lipstick was smeared all over her mouth, and there was a glazed-and-stoned look in her eyes, as if she were only barely conscious and definitely oblivious to what was going on.

_What's this then?_

"Buddy" turned back to "Cicero" and said, _You wait._

Samuel Trickler lifted his head from the girl's shoulder, and where he'd been resting his head, there was a large hickey on her throat. He raised his eyebrow, grinned roguishly -- which only made him look even uglier, if that was possible -- and put out his hand on the girl's neck, sliding it down in a broad stroke that ran on top of the fabric, squeezing her breasts one after the other on the way down.

The girl's dress changed colours from black to a vibrant red.

Arthur startled. He leaned back in his chair.

Again, Trickler ran his hand up the girl's body, fondling every square inch of her. The dress changed colours from red to blue.

A third time, and the girl's dress disappeared. She stood naked and shivering and so completely out of it, that she didn't bother covering up, but still there was a small smile on her face, because the small group of people were clapping and cheering.

"Jesus," Arthur whispered.

Trickler leaned in to snog her senseless, but the girl barely responded, and he tossed her into a group of people, one of whom was gentlemanly enough to put his dinner jacket around her shoulders to hide her nakedness, but still enough of a bastard to lead her to the back room, where he firmly shut the door behind them. "Cicero" watched Trickler without moving to go to the girl's rescue, and Arthur had no choice but to feel angry and helpless because nothing was being done to stop whatever was happening to the girl.

A beer was snatched out of someone's hand, levitated across the room, and Trickler picked it out of thin air, pouring the contents down his throat.

Arthur startled again. "What the hell?"

Special effects, CGI, some sort of Photoshop on the video. That had to be it. But why? Why waste time on that for a weapons dealer suspect?

Trickler finished his beer, letting go of the can. It continued to float in the air. He moved his fingers over it, under it, all around, and the can slowly crumpled into itself until it was little else but a flat, round disc. It turned like a wheel, spiralled, wobbled, stretched out until it was an infinity loop, then a Moebius loop, and it swirled, reflecting and catching the light.

Arthur leaned forward, fascinated. "How is he doing this?"

It had to be some sort of magic trick.

 _How are you doing this?_ someone asked.

 _A magician never reveals his secrets,_ Trickler said, grinning a set of teeth that were crooked and stained yellow. He reminded Arthur of a snake oil salesman right then and there, full of charm and quick words and easy answers, because he had the whole room enraptured.

_Show us something else!_

_Yeah! Something else! Come on!_

Trickler held up his hands in a placating gesture, and took off his jacket, rolling up his sleeves. He showed off one arm, then the other, and said, _Nothing up this sleeve. Nothing down this sleeve._

He wriggled his fingers in the air. A ball of fire appeared in his hand, round and orange and red, flickering in and out before growing bigger and bigger, when it was nestled in-between his hands.

 _That's so fake!_ someone said.

There was a commotion to the side of the room, and someone arrived with a bathroom magazine. The man who had shouted "fake" snatched the magazine out of the other person's hands, rolled it up, and poked at the ball of fire.

The magazine immediately burst into flames.

Arthur forgot to breath.

The man dropped the magazine to the floor and stamped it out. Trickler's grin widened, and he removed his hands, letting the ball float in the air without any sort of support. As he walked around it, it changed shapes, taking on the look of a butterfly, a cat, a birthday cake. He spelled out his own name, and people started shouting suggestions, each of which Trickler was happy to comply, from a rooster to a pig with wings, to an erect penis to an airplane to a flamingo and a Howitzer tank.

Arthur stared at the laptop, unable to blink, to look away, as Trickler did a complete series of other magic tricks -- he pulled one bra, then another, and another, in a handkerchief trick out of a girl's top. He levitated several objects, a table, and one small person -- the smallest in the room. He turned off the lights and made the whole room sparkle in fairy glitter. He was an entire Vegas magic act all rolled up in one.

Except it didn't look as if he used props, and from the sounds of it, Trickler wasn't a friend of Veronica's, and Veronica wouldn't have allowed him to prepare the room for the tricks. He ran the video several times, trying to see any wires, any cameras projecting holograms, but he couldn't see any.

The thing that set him off was at the very end of the video clip.

 _What the hell was all that?_ "Cicero" asked "Buddy", pulling him outside past the room, onto the balcony. The video was dark and grainy then, and Arthur could barely see "Buddy"'s expression in the gloom.

_That was magic, Cice. That was bloody _magic.__

_Arthur stared at the laptop, at that paused screen, in that moment when "Buddy" exclaimed, _That was bloody magic_ , for what seemed like forever. He didn't even notice when a pizza box was put on the table, or when Merlin put two plates down, or came back with a couple of glasses of water. It wasn't until a slice was shoved at him and Merlin clamped a hand on his shoulder that Arthur jerked out of his daze._

"Have you been there since I left?" Merlin asked, pulling out a chair and sitting down next to him. Arthur blinked, frowning a little, noticing that the distance, the lack of eye contact that Merlin had earlier in the day was gone, now, replaced with some sort of nervous energy.

"Yeah. There was a lot to read." Arthur looked at the pizza suspiciously -- it looked greasy and cheesy and was loaded with pepperoni and tiny meatballs and Canadian bacon -- his favourite. He took a bite, and it was surprisingly tasty and not nearly as greasy as he thought. "I thought you went to your uncle's."

"Nah," Merlin said, fidgeting in his seat. "I met up with a friend. We'll probably meet up later tonight too."

Arthur ignored the flare of jealousy. "Yeah. All right. Good pizza."

"Getting it here nearly got me killed. A bunch of hungry kids nearly attacked me on the tube," Merlin said, his voice serious. He gestured at the screen with the edge of his pizza. "Was there anything useful in that file?"

Arthur chuckled. He glanced at the laptop, and back at Merlin before shoving the laptop around and pushing play on the video, starting it from the beginning. "You tell me."

He watched Merlin as he finished off one slice and helped himself to another, knowing the exact moment that the video clip showed Trickler performing his first magic trick with the girl's dress, changing the colours, because Merlin stopped in mid-bite and lowered his pizza. He lowered his hand, letting it slip back onto his plate, and covered his mouth with the other, his brow pinching in the middle of his forehead, not afraid, not worried, not concerned.

Angry. That was the emotion that Arthur could see in Merlin's eyes.

Merlin's attention was glued to the screen. Eventually, he lowered his hand, and revealed that his mouth was pressed in a thin, tight line. He shoved his pizza out of the way, as if he'd lost his appetite, and watched the video all the way through to the end. Arthur was on his third slice by the time Merlin leaned back, rubbing his eyes with forefinger and thumb in the way he did when he was trying to think, and it was a gesture that Arthur had long ago dubbed Merlin's _damage control_ tic, but it seemed out of place now.

Before Arthur could figure out why Merlin's reaction was so out of character with what he'd expected, Merlin said, "It's fake."

Arthur snorted. "Yes, _Mer_ lin, MI-5 is putting stock in a video clip that their best experts say is fake. It's in there because they weren't able to spot the trick camera angles, the invisible cords, the faked dress, and the CGI."

Merlin leaned back in his chair, shaking his head. After a minute, he waved at the laptop. "What do you want me to say?"

"Explain it to me. Make me believe whatever you think it is. They didn't include an explanation for what Trickler's doing in the file, so I'm thinking that maybe they don't know how to explain it."

"Or they just didn't include that bit in the file," Merlin said, sounding sullen.

"Or that," Arthur conceded. "So, come on. Ideas."

Merlin sighed heavily, sitting up straight in his chair, reaching for his abandoned pizza. He took a bite and chewed thoughtfully. "Well, Daly and Aulfric talked about technology. Maybe he's using some sort of new tech. The girl could have been wearing a dress made out of fabric that changes colours depending on body temperature."

"Entirely possible," Arthur said. "Does it exist? Can it operate on half-degree temperature changes? Can it work that fast? Because to me, it doesn't look that warm in the room, and only a few seconds have passed. What else do you have?"

"The floating stuff. Well. Obviously it's some sort of compact tractor beam like on Star Trek," Merlin said.

Arthur couldn't help but chuckle. "Obviously."

"And the fire? The ball thingy? Just a balloon with the right mixture of helium and oxygen to keep it floating at that exact point in air. Then, he uses a fancy voice-programmable laser to do the funny pictures and the writing, and it's hot enough to set paper on fire."

"Right. I've seen those things on the Shopping Network," Arthur said, reaching for another piece of pizza. "And the levitation?"

Merlin shrugged, and he looked like he was relaxing. "The tractor beam again. I mean, he only lifted up one person, and she was the smallest and lightest in the room, so it's probably got a limited power source."

"Plausible," Arthur said. He leaned forward a bit, and his knee knocked against Merlin's leg, strangling the words in his throat. "What about... What about that last bit? When the other guy said it was magic?"

Merlin just about choked on his pizza, coughing, reaching for his water. Arthur pushed his glass closer, and Merlin swallowed hard, tears in his eyes. "Magic. Right. You believe that?"

"Aren't you supposed to?" Arthur asked. "I mean, you're the one who's pagan."

Merlin sighed heavily. "Just because I was raised to believe in the old way of doing things, the _proper_ way, where you give reverence to the earth that provides for us and all the elements that sustain us, doesn't mean that I necessarily believe in _magic_ , Arthur."

"I'm Anglican," Arthur said. "The closest thing I've come to witchcraft are the lessons they taught us in history class. The Inquisition, the witch burnings, you know, that sort of thing."

"First of all, witchcraft isn't paganism," Merlin argued. "Witchcraft is, like, you know, curses and potions and spells."

"So, like Wiccans?"

"What? No. That's -- look. Not all people who practice witchcraft are Wiccans, and not all Wiccans practice witchcraft, if that makes sense. It's like, you're expected to go to Church because you're Anglican, but not everyone who's Anglican goes to Church."

Arthur frowned slightly, but nodded. That did make sense.

"Witchcraft, well. Some people practice it seriously and they're very, very good, but the stuff they do, well, it's not like this." Merlin waved at the screen.

"You've seen magic being done, then?" Arthur asked.

Merlin hesitated. "Yeah."

"So you'd recognize it if you saw it?"

Merlin hesitated again, and his hand came up in that familiar _damage control_ gesture. Arthur wanted to reach out, take Merlin's hand, and hold it until it stopped being a tic.

"Yeah," Merlin said, his voice soft and resigned. He dropped his hand down.

"Great. That makes you our resident expert, and I need an expert, because you obviously know more about this abracadabra hocus-pocus than I do." Arthur pointed to the laptop. "Confirm it for me. Is Trickler using technology? Or is he doing magic?"

"Yeah. Maybe. Probably." Merlin said, sounding defeated.

"Which is it?"

"I don't know, Arthur. I wasn't there. This is video. It could've been staged. The whole room could've been set up beforehand with holograms and some dude behind the door running everything. Or this Jester guy could be just a real good parlour magician for all I know."

Arthur let the silence stretch -- about as long as it took to finish eating his slice, discarding the crust -- and reached over to tap a few keys on the laptop, pulling up the other video clip of the American Special Forces team going against Aredian. "How about this?"

"Oh, Gods, Arthur," Merlin sighed, rolling his eyes, but he watched the video without protest.

They talked after that -- _really_ talked, as if Arthur and Merlin had never really spoken before -- for nearly an hour. Arthur learned more about witchcraft and paganism and magic than he really ever wanted to know, and he had a feeling that he'd barely scratched the surface. Merlin either sensed that he was drowning in _too much information_ and suffocating under disbelief, logic, and common sense, because the Word of the Day was that _magic did not exist, magic was impossible_.

Except there was video.

In the end, Merlin called a break and pointed out the time, and Arthur hastily made tea and sandwiches before Krav Maga. They went to the training and came back and within the hour, Merlin was gone, because sometime in between getting pinned by Perceval for the sixth time, and Morowitz giving Merlin a lecture on _practicing what they were teaching instead of sitting around all day long watching telly and playing video games_ , Merlin had received a text message from his friend to meet someplace on the other side of town.

That gave Arthur plenty of time to get ready for his meeting with Edwin, club clothing and gun hidden in an ankle holster, and when he drove there, he realized that he had absolutely no idea what to expect besides the Lockout being one of the roughest clubs in town, so it was a good thing that he'd unconsciously strapped on the gun. There wasn't much of a line-up to get in, not much by way of bouncers, and Arthur walked into the smoke-blackened brick building into a smoke-blackened interior made up of too many cheap flashing lights with coloured shades to make the place look better than it really was, of too many people dressed like leather-wearing skin-headed toffs, and too many people dressed like regular club-goers looking for a thrill. The techno music was surprisingly good, and the bar didn't look watered down.

Arthur ordered a beer, paid in small bills -- it wouldn't do to flaunt big money in a dangerous bar -- and leaned back on the stool, looking around. He had no idea who he was looking for.

"I suppose it was too much to hope for, that you'd be a lovely brunette with a lighter complexion who could speak fluent Welsh," a man said, speaking loudly beside him. He studied Arthur up and down. "However, I must give you points. You do know how to take instructions."

Arthur sized up the other man. He was about Arthur's height, with curly dirty-blond hair cut in a stylish brush-back style, long bangs falling over his face to hide what looked to be the remnants of burns on one side of his face after extensive reconstructive plastic surgery. He seemed unaware, or uncaring, of the sidelong looks he attracted from nearby people, who were studying him in awkward double-takes while trying to look inconspicuous. Confident, suave, completely insouciant, the man reached past Arthur, barked for a pint, paid with a handful of change and was glass-in-hand before he offered an introduction.

"I'm Edwin. Olaf says hello." He tilted his head, gesturing for Arthur to follow him.

They sat at a round table vacated by a pair of leather-wearing, chain-fetish, spiky-haired women who left their discarded empties with remnants of fancy sugary drinks behind on the table, and those glasses were cleared away by a passing waitress who looked as if she'd rather stab someone than serve them. Once Edwin was assured of their general privacy, he leaned in and said, "So you're the poor sod."

"And why am I the poor sod?" Arthur asked.

"Because you're wandering into a place where you have no business being, and you don't have a clue what's going on."

"The NWO," Arthur said calmly, sipping his beer. It was vile and bitter and cheap, with the flavour of yeast and burnt caramel, the sort of thing that someone could get drunk on with whatever pennies they had in their wallets if only they could stomach the taste.

"Them, yes," Edwin said, with the quirk of a half-hearted smile and the furtive sidelong glance to see if anyone had overheard. "Where did you hear about them?"

Arthur answered him with stony silence. Edwin's eyebrow raised slowly until it was patiently expectant, and Arthur shrugged, turning away to watch the crowd. There were three types of people in the club -- the tourists, foreign and domestic, looking for a rough and tumble night for stories to tell their friends later; the locals, who came here because there was nowhere else to go and dressed for the occasion only because dressing for the occasion was the only thing keeping them from getting knifed; and the toffs, who really contributed to the atmosphere.

The subdued clothing Arthur had worn for the "date" with Edwin put him somewhere between tourist and local.

"Know how to keep mum, I see," Edwin said, his tone one of approval, but there was no missing his disappointment.

"Ask me no questions, I'll tell you no lies," Arthur said, raising his beer. "So what can you tell me?"

"What can't I tell you?" Edwin said, full of smug, all-knowing bravado. "It's your usual home-grown disorganized organization of disenfranchised youths rebelling against the institution imposing rules and regulations and, lord help them, _expectations_ of conformity and responsibility, with a bit of anarchy thrown in for good measure. They're a bit like the NRA before they were the NRA and were only a bunch of men in the backroom of a pub somewhere bitching and moaning about religion and politics, except this time around, it's a bunch of punks fresh out of drop-out school with shivs in the back of their pants and alcohol in hand, giving the two-fingers to society."

Edwin leaned forward a bit. "The funny thing is, they're not new. You can tell because they've got enough of their act together to come up with an acronym. They even have a stock handshake."

Arthur followed his gaze to a pair of men in their late twenties came together with a greeting that came with a clash of elbows. The two men could be anyone -- one was dressed in jeans and T-shirt, the other in tailored trousers and a shirt open at the throat, sleeves rolled up as if he'd just come out after a rough day at the office.

"They could be anyone. Anywhere. The graffiti artists with juvenile records eventually does grow up to become a productive member of society. They go to school. They have jobs as our tax auditors, our garbage people, our accountants. The nice woman at Tesco who smiles at you every day is inwardly wishing that you'd _fuck right off and die_.

"There's the first generation -- the originals from Wales. The second generation -- most of them from Wales and Ireland. The third and fourth -- kids from Wales and Ireland and London, too. It spread like the plague coming through Europe and is heading there, bit by bit, because the message is a powerful one."

"And that is?"

"We've become soft," Edwin said, sounding smug. "Soft and weak. Everything is mass produced and our every whim are catered to. We've never had to do anything hard in our lives. If the human race is to survive, the only right way is the old way. The hard way. Blood and strength and wits. The young laughs at the old, because the old will stumble and fall in the new world."

Arthur leaned in. "How many are they? Where are they? How much -- how strong are they?"

"Let me put it this way," Edwin said, pausing to sip at his beer. "Have you heard about them in the news? Are they going around blowing things up? Are they spraying NWO in graffiti everywhere they can? Are they posting _Join Us_ posters on the bridge? Passing around manifestos? Blogging on the Internet?"

Arthur glanced around. He shook his head.

"Exactly. No one knows much about them. They're smart. The rules are strict. Kids can be brought in and indoctrinated. Older kids have to pass a test. Anyone else, in their twenties and thirties or more -- fat lot of good it'll do, going undercover to infiltrate, because they don't trust anyone they don't already know, because they're the old guard, the people guiding the way."

Arthur pieced it together. "That's why you said what you did about my being Welsh, because people our age would be the first generation, and those would be the toffs from Wales?"

"Very good. Not slow at all you are." Edwin's brows pinched together in approval.

"What do they want?" Arthur asked.

"I can't answer that question." Edwin shrugged. "All I can do is watch over the ones of us who've managed to get close, but it's not close enough to get the answers to questions like those."

Arthur took another sip of his beer, holding it in his mouth, letting his tongue go numb. Edwin's story was fascinating, impeccably woven, and absolutely terrifying. If there was a movement that was almost completely unheard of, that existed to see the day that the world would come to an end and that sounded prepared to take over once it happened, it was this one. And, if anything, Arthur understood the connection between Mordred, the New World Order, and Aredian's people.

It came down to one thing.

Weapons. Weapons for an uprising. It sounded like a global war was starting, with troops from everywhere and no way to stop them all.

"I'm interested in one man," Arthur said.

Edwin sipped his beer, and he must have a pint of the same foul brew as Arthur, because he grimaced. "Mordred."

Arthur nodded. "Where do I find him?"

"Nobody knows," Edwin said. He leaned in conspiratorially. "The bloke's a myth. They whisper about him. He's the kid who went to school, and one day, walked out the gates, down the street, hopped a tram, and disappeared. He showed up a few years later rubbing elbows with the first generation, but mostly he stays underground. The rumour is, he's one of the ones who are going to turn the world on its ear. How, or when, or what, I don't know."

"You said one of the ones. Who are the others?"

Edwin's expression darkened, and he leaned in. "Some select members of different generations. The promising ones. They're handpicked by the elusive generation zero, the people who started the movement."

Arthur wondered if by _promising_ , Edwin meant _magic-users_ , but he didn't want to ask.

He wouldn't admit it, but he was afraid of the answer.

"Are any of them here?" Arthur glanced around. He searched, and found the two men he saw knocking elbows earlier.

"Gen zero? Hell, no. Wouldn't know where to start looking for them even if I knew who they were." Edwin half-laughed. "But there's a few first gens here. That bloke over there, for instance. Name's Bryn Nash."

Arthur glanced at the bar where a tall bloke was standing, looking crisp in tailored trousers, a black shirt, and a matching black tie. His hair was short and somewhat spiky; he sported a goatee that was probably there to hide a weak chin; and his smile, curved in a laugh, didn't meet his eyes as he half-listened to someone talking to him, but stared out at the crowd, his eyes fixed on a thin, pretty brunette sitting in a booth across the club.

"That bird he's staring at, she's another. Freya Peters." Freya was too-thin and fragile. Arthur couldn't see much of her face, but there was a determined set to her chin, and she was using sharp hand gestures to compound her point in what looked to be a serious discussion.

There was a long silence, and Edwin said, "Well, I'll be. He's a new one. Must be high-up, if Bryn lets him near his girl."

The crowd parted, and Arthur saw who Freya was talking to.

Merlin.

 

  


**ooOOoo**  


 

_In the category of Awkward Conversations About Magic, the academy awards the Oscar to..._

On the one hand, most of the conversation that Merlin had with Arthur about magic had been completely theoretical, and some of it, he'd pulled out of his arse because he was the last expert on the planet when it came to magic. He had never given any thought whatsoever to the whys and heretofores of magic. As far as he was concerned, his magic worked, _however_ that it worked, and that was that.

On the other hand, Arthur hadn't started laughing when Merlin stumbled in his explanations, hadn't asked Merlin to prove he knew what he was talking about -- apparently the videos were enough to convince him that magic was _real_.

The conversation had reached the point where Arthur had crested his maximum intake levels, for which Merlin was grateful, and he let Arthur mull over all the information that Merlin gave him through an early tea and through the drive over to Morowitz's dojo. The evil Krav Maga instructor had picked up on the fact that both Arthur and Merlin were distracted, but where Arthur could operate at his usual level of perfection without sparing too much brain power in defence or offence, Merlin landed flat on his arse seven times, kissed the floor with his face four times, and toppled over and hit the wall at least once. The other five times had been on purpose.

He was starting to lose track of which bruises could be blamed on practicing his magic with Gaius, and which ones were Morowitz's fault, but either way, he was grateful that he had at least one plausible excuse for the black and blue splotches spreading on his body, because he didn't think anyone, not even Arthur, wouldn't try to have him committed if he said that he'd gotten them from training his magic.

Well, maybe not Arthur. By the time they returned to the flat, Arthur looked a little bit haunted, as if the reality of magic had finally dawned on him, and he was struggling to hold onto the slippery threads of sanity.

If Merlin were being perfectly honest with himself, his own grasp on sanity had escaped the moment he'd met Arthur's crisp and clear sky-blue eyes over the pizza slices that started the whole thing. The power in Arthur's gaze had rattled his brain so thoroughly that Merlin was completely, utterly unable to come up with a plausible answer or retort to the whole magic debacle. At the very least, he should at least have _tried_ a little harder to deny its existence.

Even with the damning videos.

Merlin half-wished he hadn't bailed on Arthur and gone to meet Freya, but his excuse was that he didn't know where his head was at the moment. He felt as if he spent any more time in Arthur's presence, that he would throw himself at Arthur's mercy and confess, _I have magic too._

Merlin shuddered. That was a disastrous thought.

On that same note, heading to this part of town to meet Freya was just as disastrous.

It took longer than he'd liked to get there -- the Underground was running slow because of some sort of maintenance on the tracks, and his _Im on my way, the trains shut down_ text to Freya was followed by _Jesus fuck are they always this bad_ , until, finally, some forty-five minutes later, he texted again, _Finally! Wont be another 10_.

Fortunately, Freya texted back, _Its all right just get here_ and gave him directions.

The Lockout was a dive in every sense of the word. The building looked as if it survived WWII bombings twice, was rebuilt once, got burned down, and the outside of it was patched over just enough to meet building regulations. There was no sign, just a couple of bouncers at the front doors -- solid steel doors painted an ominous, décor-matching black -- and a line of people waiting to get in.

Merlin was already late; he wasn't going to wait in line. He went right to the bouncers, who stopped him.

Both of the bouncers were taller and wider than Merlin by half again, and probably outweighed him double, and where someone would expect that girth to be mostly flab, it was solid muscle, if the way Merlin bounced off their arms was anything to go by.

"I'm late, mate," Merlin said, gesturing to the open doors. "I'm meeting a friend."

"Good friend?" the bouncer on the left asked.

"Old friend," Merlin said, which was apparently the right thing to say, because they let him in. He took two steps inside and was immediately blinded by bad lighting and deafened by halfway decent techno. There weren't a lot of people lingering in the entrance of the club, but the dance floor was packed solid of people of all shapes and size and styles, and there was just the faintest undertone of _wrong_ that Merlin caught himself searching out every exit.

The first exit was the one through which he'd come. Another just past the bar. Two emergency exits on the far wall. There might even be one at the end of the corridor where the loos were.

Merlin marked them down for future reference and went looking for Freya. He saw plenty of men in the requisite toff uniform of dirty jeans, torn shirts and leather jackets. There were a disproportionate number of women to men in usual groupie fashion, because more birds brought in more men who would pay for their drinks, and the women were wearing slinkies and skinnies, even the ones who should have thought twice before stepping out of their flats dressed like that. There were the posh people, too, done up as if they'd come straight from the offices, and there were the tourists, who stood out a bit like sore thumbs.

And no sign of Freya.

He was about to pull out his phone to text her when Freya burst through a crowd of people, her hair twisted up in a do, a touch of pink on her cheeks and red on her lips. She'd changed out of the too-large dress for something that at least fit her better, even if it was a hideous scoop-neck sequined tank top without much shape to it and a pair of jeans that made her look so skinny, Merlin was obese in comparison.

"You made it!" she shouted.

"Barely!" he shouted back.

Freya grabbed his wrist and pulled him to the bar, and they both ordered drinks that Merlin paid for. She leaned in to talk into his ear. "I thought you were skint and that were why you were couch-surfing!"

"Odd jobs!" Merlin said, leaning in.

"What?"

"I do odd jobs! Money under the table!" Merlin said. "It's not much, but it keeps me flush in beer!"

Freya brightened at what he'd said, as if he were becoming more and more attractive all the time, and Merlin couldn't understand why. He'd noticed that her body language had changed, too. She was less reserved now, less shy, more upbeat, happier, as if this place, this environment, it was more her territory, where she was most comfortable.

Merlin had never seen her like this. She was always wrapped tight, as if to relax a little bit would be to release the monster that she turned into when she was agitated. Had she learned to control it? Had it stopped entirely? Was there no more monster?

And then he saw her eyes, big and black in the brown, and he wondered if she was on drugs. His gaze trailed down to her arms, but he didn't see any track marks.

That didn't mean anything, though. She could be taking pills, or smoking, or sniffing. Or she could just be drunk.

Experience had taught Merlin that mixing drugs or alcohol with magic was asking for trouble. He hoped that wasn't Freya's solution, but he wasn't going to ask or bring up Freya's monster unless she did first.

"Come on, there's a place where we can talk!"

Freya grabbed his arm and plunged them both into the crowd. Merlin couldn't imagine where they could go to talk in this place -- the music was blasting from speakers that were bigger than Perceval and it was making the floor vibrate as if England was going through a bomb blast relic from the last world war. He slid into a booth next to her, the U-shape open out toward the dance floor and the bar, and miraculously, the music abated to a tolerable level.

Then he saw the scratches on the edge of the black laminate that was their flimsy table with not enough room for more than a couple of empties, and froze.

Magic.

His fingers drifted over the surface of the table, skirting the edge of one of the runes etched on the table, and he felt it, subtle, a quiet hum, an echo of silence battling against the music on the other side of an invisible barrier. Merlin drew his hand away quickly, picking up his beer and taking a sip and deciding that he wasn't going to drink anymore anytime soon, not only because he wanted his wits about him and his magic free of encumbrances, but because the beer was absolutely, completely foul.

It was a toss-up between goat piss and having been fermented in dirty gym socks.

Merlin offered Freya a small smile and hoped he only looked a little bit rattled because of the sudden decrease in music. His eyes went up to the shape of the booth, the tall walls around them, and he said, "Wow, those are great acoustic dampeners!"

"Aren't they? It was Bryn's idea. He designed and built all the booths." There was pride in Freya's voice, and she sat up even straighter now, as if invoking Bryn's name gave her more presence, more reputation, more of a sense of _self_.

"He owns the place then?" It seemed like the sort of thing Bryn would do.

"He does!" Freya grinned. She leaned in, and Merlin could see the change in conversation even before it began. "I told him you were in town and what you've been up to. He's interested. He told me that I could talk to you."

_Interested in what?_

"What about?"

"You joining us!" Freya said.

Merlin leaned in, crossing his arms on the table, bowing his head a bit. "Joining what?"

Freya's smile faltered. "You were there in the beginning, Merlin. You _know_. Don't you remember Bryn and Tristan talking about it?"

"Bryn and Tristan talked a lot," Merlin told Freya, offering her a weak smile. "Usually while holding my head down the loo. What is this about?"

Freya's smile disappeared completely, and Merlin thought that he'd lost her before he even began. He wasn't cut out for the secret agent business if he could screw up this quickly, he decided, so it was a good thing he never wanted to be 007 when he grew up. For one thing, he had to think of all the beautiful young women with the funny names that he'd have to leave behind, heartbroken, because he'd rather shag the bad guy. Not the guy with the steel teeth, though. No one should let those teeth anywhere near their soft bits.

" _Us_ , Merlin," Freya said again, her enthusiasm fading, her brow pinched. "Our generation. Getting what's coming to us because it's owed to us, because we deserve it, because we're the strongest ones, and _they_ know it too, and that's why they keep us under their thumb, forcing us to do whatever they want, throwing us in jail or in psych hospitals when we try to break free.

"People like _me_ , Merlin. You remember? You remember when you found me, after..." Freya paused, her lips in a thin white line, and she pressed on. "There's a lot of us like that. Me, for one. Bryn's learning, and he's getting really good. Tristan always had the touch and he's getting stronger by the day. It's us, you know, the originals, we've been _gifted_ with an ancient birthright, and we're about to claim it."

Merlin frowned a little, trying to decide if Freya had always been like this, a little unstable, or if this was just a masterful brainwashing done by Bryn and Tristan and the rest of them, but Freya looked and sounded as if she truly believed it, and that made it even worse. "Who's _them_ that you're talking about?"

Freya threw out her arms around the room, indicating everything and everyone and no one in particular. "Them! The administration, the government, the politicians --"

"Oh, you mean The Man, Big Brother, that lot?"

"Yes! Them!" Freya watched him with wide eyes, but when Merlin didn't say anything and put on an expression he hoped looked thoughtful, went on, "You were always a strange one, Merlin. You never really fit in, did you? You did what everyone expected you to do, and I remember you were smart, you aced your A-levels, but you don't fit the _mould_. You're not posh and polished and you always spoke up when people were different and you stood up for me because I was in a bad way and you got yourself in trouble a few times... Why do you think you're like this now? That you're forced to live on the generosity of others? That you can't find a steady job? How many jobs have you had and how many did you get bounced from because you didn't toe the line?"

Merlin tilted his head to the side and shrugged his shoulder in a gesture that could mean anything that Freya wanted it to mean, and she took it to mean "A whole lot" and went on, her voice softer now.

"You should join us. It would be perfect. I mean, you're from the source, too, from Wales. And you're -- you believe, don't you? I remember your uncle used to have the Beltane feasts, didn't he? And you helped out during the celebrations, right? You know the old ways, and you follow them?"

Merlin squirmed in his seat, uncomfortable. He'd never spoken about it with Freya, and he wondered how much she knew about him. "You know I do," he said, keeping his voice low.

"And you _know_. About me. And you weren't scared of me. You took care of me when no one else would have, they would've locked me up and done experimentations on me, they would've. You know about magic, don't you? You probably do a bit yourself."

Merlin glanced up sharply, half-laughing, and feeling sick for lying, but Freya had stars in her eyes and she didn't see it. "The most I've done, I mixed up a couple of love potions that did bollocks all except turn my fingers blue for three weeks. _You're_ magic, Freya. I'm not."

"But you can learn," she said, reaching over the table to grab his hands. Her grip was deceptively strong, and he didn't think he would be able to wedge himself free if she really wanted to hold on. "We'll teach you. Bryn could teach you."

She turned around to look at the bar, and Merlin followed her gaze there right when the crowd cleared, and there was no missing Bryn, who leaned against the bar as if he owned the place --which he did -- watching them as if he had been waiting for this moment for a signal. But the sight of his old schoolyard bully wasn't what made his insides quail tight. It was _Arthur._

Arthur was sitting at a table with some other bloke, both of them dressed for clubbing but not with anything flashy, both with drinks on the table that looked as if they were being drunk at nursing speeds for appearances sake only. The other man might have been handsome, once, except part of his face was scarred, and there was a smug, pompous look to him that made Merlin think of Arthur, sometimes, when Arthur made the effort to be a spectacular prat. That man was watching them -- Merlin and Freya -- with interest, a speculative look on his face.

For a moment, a brief moment that lasted an eternity, Merlin could see what was going through Arthur's head right now. Arthur _knew_ about Freya, about the NWO, all the dirty details that Merlin was just learning now, and his expression changed from dumbfounded shock, broken trust, complete betrayal, only to shake himself out of it with a glance at the man he was sitting with, and another glance at Merlin as if he _didn't believe it_ , not for one second, that Merlin was some sort of traitor, some sort of undercover double agent working for the other side.

In that same instant, he turned away, looking at his mate with mild interest at whatever was being said, acting as if he hadn't received the shock of his life when he'd seen Merlin, and the two of them colluded in quiet conversation, watching Bryn walk past their table and head toward Merlin and Freya.

If Merlin's expression betrayed anything, it might have been recognition, but that could easily be written off as knowing Bryn, even now, years later, with him balding, his hair in M-pattern baldness, face marked with wavy lines on one cheek, a large whorl-tribal tattoo on the side of his throat, nose ring and pierced ears. The years hadn't been kind, but when he'd been a toff before, he was a toff now, with prison gauntness and broader shoulders and a rounder, muscular chest than he had in school.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Arthur shift in his seat and fold his arms on the table, leaning forward with a hard glance of _you'll be answering questions later_ , and Merlin ignored Arthur in favour of taking Bryn's hand and shaking it with the quaver of someone meeting an old bully for the first time in ages.

"Emrys."

"Nash."

Bryn didn't smile, didn't blink, didn't show anything but caution and evaluation, eyeing Merlin up and down, taking in the ratty, well-worn, holes-in-knees-and-assorted-spots jeans, the faded black T-shirt with a ghost image of a cover logo for a band that went defunct almost a decade ago, the scuffed Converses that were the newest thing he owned, purchased about three years ago on R&R when the last pair had run through the duct tape holding them together. When he was done, Bryn decided that Merlin measured up, and he clonked his beer on the black laminate table and slid in next to Freya, his arm draping over her shoulders with the possessive familiarity of having done so a million times already.

"How's life?" Bryn asked.

"Won't complain," Merlin said, and his hand shook just a little when he picked up his beer and grimaced, and he told himself it was because the beer was toxic, and it had nothing to do with the memories of getting beaten up by Bryn and his cronies as a kid. It shouldn't matter to him anymore -- for one thing, he was pretty sure that he could take Bryn now, even without his magic.

"Why not? That's what everyone does," Bryn said, drinking down the vile beer as if it was manna.

"There's always someone who's had it worse than me," Merlin said.

"And how bad have you had it?" Bryn asked, his gaze steady, measuring, _clever_ , as if sometime in between dropping out of school and getting out of prison, someone had given him a brain. It was disconcerting. "Didn't you finish uni?"

Merlin gave Bryn a short nod. There was no point in lying about that, since his name could be Googled, but beyond that, most of his work was classified secret and he'd fallen from the face of the earth where the Internet was concerned the day he joined up. "Yeah."

"No job?"

"Here and there. Whatever I can find," Merlin said, shrugging a shoulder. More and more, he was getting the feeling that it was a very good thing he'd never mentioned the army, but he wouldn't bank on Bryn finding out anyway.

Almost as if Bryn read his mind, Bryn said, "How come you didn't follow Will into the army?"

Merlin heard all the warning bells go off, and looked up in time to see Freya glance at Bryn in dumbfounded concern, and to catch the small smirk on Bryn's face, the one he had whenever he was sure that he'd cornered someone.

"I did," Merlin said, though it was more the other way around, not to hear the way Will told the story.

"And?"

Merlin leaned back in his chair, managed a rueful chuckle before gesturing to himself, skinny and scrawny and looking even more so now, with the narrow jeans and decade-old T-shirt. "Do I look like army material?"

"Not even on your best day," Freya said with a laugh.

"So, washed out then?" Bryn asked, and Merlin hid his nod behind another painful swallow of the amber liquid masquerading as beer. Bryn caught Merlin's expression and laughed. "Yeah, it takes some getting used to."

"I thought American beer was bad," Merlin said, shaking his head.

"So what are you doing now? I mean, you've heard what Freya had to say," Bryn said, glancing at Freya briefly. "What do you think?"

Merlin hesitated. Then he shook his head and laughed, elbows on the table again. "Sounds like the same old garbage from the schoolyard, you know, the shite you used to go on about while I was making friends with the dirt after you introduced me to it with your fist."

Bryn's laugh was humourless. "You holding a grudge there, mate? We were kids."

Merlin shrugged his shoulders and made a _it is what it is_ gesture with his hands. "You going to take me out back to the loo and flush my head in? How's now any different than it was back then?"

Bryn leaned forward menacingly, but there was a friendly -- as friendly as he could manage -- smile on his lips. "Because we're real, mate. Everything I talked about back then, it's real, and it's happening. This shite civilization we're living in now, it's going to fall apart in spectacular fashion, and it's going to be the rest of us who are going to survive. We'll be in charge then. We'll be in control. Don't tell me that you don't want to be on top for once."

"Go on, then," Merlin said, shaking his head. "You tell me this. Why me? I haven't nothing. No connections, no money, barely a paper trail to prove I exist. And I'm not like..."

He gestured at Freya.

"That's exactly why, Emrys. You don't have much, but you understand what we're about because it's in your blood, yeah? Plus, you've been everywhere in Europe, haven't you? You've been around. You know people. You can help spread the word."

"A glorified messenger boy," Merlin said, snorting. "Yeah, I went to uni for that. It's my dream job."

"You haven't a job now, do you?" Bryn pointed out, and Merlin shrugged a shoulder, giving him the point. "Besides, it wouldn't be for long. Maybe a year, maybe less. I looked you up, mate. You've got serious credit to your name. Telecommunications and encryption? That could be useful, if we needed it to take down the establishment. If you do right by us, we'll do right by you."

"A year, huh?" Merlin picked up the beer again, looked at it for a long moment, and put it down, thinking better of it -- something that amused Bryn enormously. "You know what? I've heard that before. I'm done with that bottom-feeder minimum wage four-wall cubicle fourteen-hour days bollocks that goes nowhere. I'm not starting from the ground-up. If you need me, you'll start me a bit higher up."

"This isn't a job interview, Emrys," Bryn said, his expression hard, and Freya made a soft little sound. Merlin glanced over and saw her agitation. "You're in or you're out. If you're out..."

He trailed off with the menace of someone who knew how to make proper threats, and Merlin felt his throat constrict. "I didn't say that," he said, and his words came out with an audible squeak that satisfied Bryn's bully instincts but did nothing to bolster Merlin's self-esteem. "I'm just saying. I'm not a soapbox preacher. You want a mouthpiece? That's not me. I can talk to people, sure, feel things out, but..."

He shook his head.

"I see you found your balls, but you're still a wallflower," Bryn said. He smirked, nasty and dark, just like old times. "You haven't changed much, have you?"

Merlin glanced at Freya. "I guess not."

They stared at each other for what seemed like hours but was really barely a full minute. "What do you want then, Emrys?"

Merlin didn't answer for a long time. He stared at his beer and didn't look up when he said, "I want to feel useful."

That seemed to ease things somewhat, because Bryn huffed and Freya reached across the table to take Merlin's hand, squeezing in what he supposed was reassurance but really only cracked his fingers instead. "Do you have a computer?"

"In serious need of an upgrade, but yeah," Merlin said.

Bryn was silent, considering, when he finally said, "All right. Here's what we're going to do. We'll set up a dropbox for you. Freya will text you the details. Every now and then, we'll send you a job to do. Some information we want you to get for us. Some tech to crack. Whatever it is. Then in a year, maybe sooner, if everything goes well, we'll bring you in all the way."

Merlin chewed his lower lip. This was too easy. He didn't understand why Bryn was so keen to get him under his wing -- but then again, Merlin was a known entity. Bryn was right -- Merlin hadn't changed much. He was still thin, still quiet, still deferential, but that was only because this was _Bryn_ , who used to beat him up when he was a kid, who stole his lunch money, who followed him home and stole his bike. And that was on a good week.

What Bryn didn't know was that Merlin only kept his head down, sometimes hiding behind Will when Will was around, because he _had_ to. He didn't want to attract attention -- and yet he had. He didn't want to fight back because that would make things worse -- so he didn't. But he could fight back, he could give as good as he got -- if he were willing to show his magic.

He hadn't been, not then. He still wasn't, not now.

"Right," Merlin said, half-chuckling. "Whatever. I'm not going to hold my breath."

Bryn quaffed down the last of his beer and the glass clanked on the table hard enough to bump Merlin's glass and spill the contents. Merlin yanked his hand away but it got splashed anyway, and for some reason, the gesture brought a smirk to Bryn's lips.

Bryn leaned in. "I know we've had some bad blood in the past, but that's in the past, Emrys. Freya vouches for you, says you did good by her, and I know you're the sort to keep your head down and your mouth shut, yeah?"

Merlin nodded mutely.

"This is real. It's happening. You want to be on the right side when things go to shite for everyone that's not us. So you do what we tell you to do, and you'll be fine. We'll take care of you."

Merlin nodded again. "But the dropbox. I'm heading off the island next week. How am I supposed to pick up anything?"

Freya murmured excitedly in Bryn's ear, either telling him something or reminding him of something he already knew, because Bryn's grin became less menacing and more reassuring. "That's brilliant. We need you to stay on the move. You'll be more untraceable that way."

Merlin looked doubtful, but Bryn reached over the table and smacked him on the arm with a blow hard enough to nearly knock Merlin out of the booth. "Chin up, mate. Trust me. I won't let anything happen to you. In fact, as a gesture of good faith, I'm going to tell you something that's going to save your life."

"What's that?"

"We're about to have us a party, right here and right now. It's going to be Stone Age. You want to get out alive, you want to piss off."

Merlin frowned. He glanced uncertainly at Freya, but her face was lit up like the Red Light district, big smile and wide eyes and encouraging nod barely holding back her excitement.

"You have to go, Merlin. It'll be safer for you. You don't have..." Her smile was a little nervous, and she made a little gesture to herself.

_Magic._

Merlin didn't have "magic". He almost laughed.

He looked out toward the crowd, at the toffs who thought they belonged, at the tourists who didn't know what they were getting into, at the well-dressed homebodies and locals who were lurking about in every corner, surveying the crowd as if it was their own personal playground. They were using their bodies to cover the actions of the people behind them -- people whose lips were moving, whose hands were gesturing, whose eyes seemed to flash either red in the gloom or black in the light, and the magic that jerked out was brutal, violent, hurting.

Merlin's magic recoiled from it.

"Go on, Merlin," Freya said encouragingly, taking his wrist and tugging his arm as if she expected to pull him out. "I'll call you, I promise."

"What's going on, Freya?"

"In a year, if you're still with us, I'll show you myself, Emrys," Bryn said, and Merlin could see that the man was out of patience and that it was time to go. "Like I said, piss off."

Merlin slid out of the booth. "Right. Okay. Yeah. I'll. You know."

It was Freya who shoved him toward the front of the club, Freya who turned her back on him and went to join the others on the dance floor, Freya who threw her arms up in the air and started jumping in rhythm, her body limned in flickering disco lights and grace and _magic_. She was gorgeous, beautiful, free, the way she should have been when she was young, without worry and care.

It was hard to look away from Freya, from the magic that was swirling around her with the dangerous curl of something about to be unleashed, but Merlin looked away, slipping from the table, intending to take Bryn's warning to heart and to get himself -- and Arthur -- out of there.

He probably wasn't meant to see the way Bryn turned away from Freya for a moment, as he looked past the crowd and made eye contact with someone, and gave him a curt nod, the way mob men in the Hollywood movies gave curt nods to the people in their employ, and made a slight gesture with his hand, tilting his head back in invitation.

Merlin ducked his head down, pretending he didn't notice, and when he looked up again, Bryn's attention was on the dance floor, watching Freya dance, and he was moving toward some of the other men in the room, men who nodded greetings and welcomed him in their little groups, and Merlin knew that he was effectively dismissed.

The first thing he did was look for Arthur.

Arthur wasn't sitting at the table with the other man -- _thank fuck_ , because Merlin had a very, very bad feeling right now -- but the bloke was still there, watching the show while pretending that he wasn't watching at all. A wave of panic bubbled under Merlin's skin, and he worked his way through the crowd, trying to seem as if he weren't looking for anyone, as if he were casually heading out --

_There!_

Arthur was coming back from the bar, a pint in both hands, looking grim and displeased, his jaw in a firm set because the crowd at the front had started to shift toward the dance floor where everyone was gathering. The locals were streaming out the other way; the tourists who didn't know what was going on were moving with most of the crowd, and there had to be a way to tell Arthur that it was time to go without being obvious about it --

The crowd picked that moment to thicken, and Merlin squawked when someone knocked him back, but he slipped past one bloke, then two, and ducked past a bird with hair in pseudo-mohawk style. The crowd was forcing him to change his direction to head toward Arthur, not that he _minded_ , and in an inward prayer that Arthur wouldn't kill him where he stood, rammed his shoulder hard against Arthur.

Beer -- that vile, bitter excuse of a beer -- from two full, frothing pints dripped from his shirt, his pants, and onto his shoes and the floor.

Arthur's eyes went big and round and _outraged_ and he blurted out, "You _idiot!_ " loud enough to be heard over the pounding music.

The collision was enough to make Merlin bounce backward. Someone pushed him back at Arthur for a second go, and this time the pints in Arthur's hands dropped and crashed and bounced on the floor because they weren't really glass, just looked like it, and Arthur grabbed Merlin.

"Get out of here now!" Merlin said in Arthur's ear, and he could tell that Arthur heard him because Arthur's eyes narrowed, just for a moment, and whatever else had been about to come out of his mouth didn't come out.

Instead, Arthur shoved Merlin away, past him, toward the exit. "You bloody fucking idiot! Do you know how much this shirt costs?"

"I'm sorry okay? I'm really sorry! It'll wash out!" Merlin held out his hands in self defence as Arthur advanced on him.

"Really? You absolute, complete, utter _moron!_ It'll come out? This is _silk!_ It won't wash out! The shirt is ruined!"

Merlin stopped walking backward and lunged at Arthur. "And I said I was sorry, you prat! What the hell do you want, a pound of flesh?"

Arthur's expression darkened to scary depths, his chin tucking down like a bull ready to charge. "I'll take it right out of your arse!"

Merlin's eyes went wide despite himself, and he hurried toward the exit, stumbling out, glancing over his shoulder only once as he crossed the street to see Arthur at the entrance, scowling at him, patting himself down -- wet shirt front and pants, searching for something.

He was putting on a good show, too, his expression scrunching in renewed outrage, and Merlin started running when Arthur howled, "The bastard nicked my wallet!"

 

  


**ooOOoo**  


 

It was easy to catch up to Merlin. He'd stopped running one block over, just around the bend, once he was out of sight of the Lockout and of anyone who might be watching.

Arthur had never known Merlin to be so paranoid.

"What the fuck were you doing there?" Arthur hissed. "Do you know who you were talking to?"

"Never mind that. Where's your car?"

"Back that way," Arthur said, his brow furrowed, trying to make sense of a _jittery_ Merlin who wouldn't make eye contact, who kept looking past Arthur to see if anyone was coming their way. " _Mer_ lin! What's going on?"

Bright blue eyes like jewels framed in gold finally looked at Arthur. There was confusion and determination and uncertainty, as if Merlin knew he needed to do something, but he didn't know if he should or even that he could. His mouth worked, but no sound came out, and Arthur grabbed his arms and shook him once, twice, hoping that he could loosen the words that were stuck in Merlin's throat.

Merlin was fragile in his hands, but the shaking seemed to help.

"Remember you asked me if I could recognize magic when I saw it?" Merlin spoke in a tumbling rush, breaking eye contact.

"Yeah?"

Merlin made a gesture that brushed Arthur's shoulder and pointed in the general direction of the Lockout. "That!"

Arthur couldn't see the Lockout from here, but he turned to look, keeping a tight hold on a trembling Merlin, not quite sure if Merlin would cut and run or collapse on him. " _Mer_ lin --"

"Get your car. Don't go back inside. Don't even think it. Just get your car and go."

Arthur frowned. "I was with someone --"

Merlin's eyes went wide with alarm. "Well, he wasn't with you! He's one of _them_ , Arthur! He's NWO!"

"What?" Arthur's gaze darted sideways, feeling the frown pinch between his brows, a brief, icy wash of confusion and betrayal straightening his spine. He glanced over his shoulder -- damn it, but Merlin's paranoia was rubbing off on him -- but no one was there. Why would Olaf send him to a known NWO member for information?

Unless he really was undercover, despite what Edwin had said. Or. Unless he wasn't known as NWO. He was a double-agent, and Olaf didn't have a clue. But that didn't explain how Merlin could know that.

"How do you --"

"Because I saw Bryn give him the nod."

Arthur relaxed somewhat. "That's your evidence? A nod?"

"You don't know Bryn," Merlin hissed.

"And you do?"

Merlin's hand threaded through his head in a _we don't have time for this_ gesture, and he took a step close to Arthur, so close that he could feel the heat radiating from his body despite the complete lack of covering against the elements, so close that he could smell the beer on his breath and the lingering scent of bar soap on his skin.

"I went to school with him! He's one of the ones who went around blathering about the NWO like he was a newly converted cult member! He'd sooner spit in your face, beat you to an inch of your life, lock you out in the yard _bloody fucking starkers in the middle of the goddamn winter_ , Arthur! Yeah, he nodded! He doesn't fucking nod!"

Arthur stared, not sure what to say, half-awed and half-enraged at this glimpse into Merlin's childhood, because it couldn't be anything else, and he looked over his shoulder again. "You're sure?"

"I'm sure," Merlin said, quiet, calm, and the gold rimming his bright blues sparkled.

"Magic? They're doing magic in there?" Arthur asked, and Merlin nodded. "What are they doing?"

"I don't know, Arthur. I don't. I just know..." There was a flicker of sudden understanding in Merlin's eyes, as if he finally figured out what was happening, and he went pale, even more so than he was normally, and Arthur thought he was going to faint. Arthur tightened his grip on Merlin, but Merlin shook his head and swallowed hard. "I just know it's not changing girls' dress colour or laser-writing names and drawing butterflies in the air. It's worse. Much worse."

Before Arthur could answer, Merlin grabbed his shirt. "Don't go in there, Arthur. Don't you dare. I know you want to see it with your own eyes, but not this time. Just, don't."

"All right, all right," Arthur fished in his pocket, pulling out his phone before realizing that he didn't know what he was going to do with it. "What are you going to do?"

Merlin leaned his weight on one foot, then the other, and back again, indecision marring his otherwise placid expression.

"Don't be an idiot, Merlin," Arthur said, suddenly afraid, very afraid, that Merlin was going to run in there on his own to face whatever it was and get himself killed, and Arthur couldn't have that. "It won't be any safer for you in there either."

At the same time, Arthur itched to call someone, _anyone_ , but who would he call for a magical emergency? It wasn't as if the police department had itself an anti-magic special squad, and he could imagine the 999 call.

_Police, what is your emergency?_

_Hi, I'm outside the Lockout club, you know the one, yeah? No, I don't know the names of the cross roads. You can probably find it in your directory. Anyway, there's some witches in there -- no, not witches, because someone told me that witches don't do this kind of magic, and --_

_Sir? Are you having me on?_

_Oh no, definitely not, you've got to send everything, sirens flashing, because my friend told me that there's bad magic going on in there right now and that people are getting hurt, and that it's really awful --_

It sounded absolutely ridiculous, even only in his head. There was also the niggling question as to why he was so willing to believe Merlin in the first place, but what it came down to, he _believed_ Merlin, and that was all that mattered.

Arthur grimaced, hating this feeling of helplessness, of not being able to help, of not knowing what to do. The worst part was that Merlin had tried to teach him, and Arthur had tried to listen, but much of it had sounded so absolutely _absurd_ and unbelievable that it was like one of his English Literature classes all over again -- in one ear and out the other, with the faintest, fleeting concept of it sticking around long enough for him to write the exam in the broadest strokes of bollocks that would net him a passing grade. He'd wished he'd listened harder.

"Yeah, you're right," Merlin said, his voice quiet still desperate, still worried. "All right, look, they can't see us together -- I'll tell you why later, I promise. I'm going to take the train down one stop over and I'll meet you there, yeah?"

Arthur let Merlin go slowly and pointed a finger at him. "You're not going to do a runner are you?"

"No, no. I'll be there. Just. Steer clear of the place, okay?"

Arthur nodded, and Merlin nodded, and they both walked backward slowly, Arthur not wanting to let Merlin out of his sight because he was, well, _Merlin_ , and prone to getting in all sorts of trouble if Arthur didn't keep an eye on him. He tripped down the curb, caught himself, and when he looked up, Merlin had turned away, his hands in his pockets, looking too thin and bare and cold in that flimsy little T-shirt of his and those straight jeans that might as well have been skinnies on him, his shoulders up around his ears as he headed toward the nearest Underground stop.

The cell phone buzzed in Arthur's hand, and he answered it without checking the call display.

"What the fuck, Arthur?" It was Edwin, and Arthur grimaced. "Are you some sort of stupid? I finish telling you that it looked like the guy was being courted for the NWO by a couple of originals, and you _chase after him?_ "

"I wanted information," Arthur said, after only the briefest hesitation. "I followed him, but --"

"You fucking wanker," Edwin said.

"Yeah, so what, I lost him."

"You coming back to the club?" Edwin asked, and Arthur wasn't sure if it was Merlin's warning ringing in his ears, or his own personal alarm system, but he tensed up and glanced all around him as he made his way back to the Lockout.

"No, I've had it tonight. The bloke knocked the pints on me, and I reek. I'm fairly sure that the beer's potent enough to make my shirt disintegrate, and I don't fancy making it home bare-chested."

"You want to leave now?" Edwin asked. There was a pause, and he added, "You wanted to know about them, yeah? Well, there's more."

"We'll talk later," Arthur said.

"I can't promise I'll be around later," Edwin said, his tone sickly sweet, like the stick of honey down his spine. Arthur's stomach roiled in response. "Now's the best time. Don't be a princess -- so what if your shirt's soaked. Suck it up."

"Are you still in the club?"

"No, I'm outside, looking for you."

Arthur rounded the corner, and sure enough, there he was -- right in the middle of the road, and the road was empty and deserted. The line-up to get into the Lockout had dried up, the bouncers were nowhere in sight, and the heavy steel doors were shut.

The alarm bells in his head were ringing louder. Arthur shouldered the building, keeping out of sight.

"I'll be right there. But, fuck, the club's too loud. Is there another place we can go talk?"

"I'll be waiting," Edwin said, and hung up without answering Arthur's question.

_Fuck._

Arthur's car was a block past the Lockdown. He could take the long way around and avoid Edwin entirely, but that would make Edwin suspicious, and if he really was one of the NWO, thinking he was undercover, he would wonder why Arthur hadn't made an appearance. Arthur got the gun out of his ankle holster, tucked it in the waistband at the small of his back, conveniently hidden by the tail of his shirt. Then, because Uther Pendragon hadn't raised an idiot, Arthur fast-dialled the nearest person he knew -- Merlin -- and pocketed his phone, keeping his thumb on the call button in case he needed help.

He walked around the corner, shaking his head, glancing here and there, taking a deep breath as if he'd just come back from a run, putting on his face a look of annoyed disappointment that wouldn't be uncommon on the face of any other jarhead who'd been cheated out of a fight. He walked toward Edwin, keeping a careful distance, and said, "You know what? I'm done in. I'll call Olaf in the morning."

"But --"

"Call me when you're free, we'll do this again," Arthur said, and he'd no sooner walked past Edwin that Edwin fell in step beside him with something of preternatural speed, grabbed Arthur's arm, and pressed a gun against the side of his throat. He started to twist away, to react, to knock the other man's gun away in one of Morowitz' trademark Krav Maga blocks, but Edwin said something sharp and guttural, and Arthur suddenly couldn't move.

He could barely breath. There was something compressing his arms to his chest. He wasn't paralyzed, he could still shift his body here and there, and he _moved_ , pushing the call button on his phone with a strangled sound to cover up the motion. "What --"

Arthur desperately hoped that Merlin would pick up. Then he remembered that Merlin was heading down to the Underground where cell phone reception was spotty at least, and his heart sank.

"Shut up," Edwin snarled. "Figures that you'd be difficult."

Edwin's hand on his arm tightened, and the ties holding him in place -- invisible ties, ties that he couldn't see, that didn't exist, that were

_magic_

in a way that was impossible, that shouldn't be real -- loosened enough for Arthur to follow at a stumble, as if he were wrapped up in thick sailor ropes, from his chest all the way down to his ankles.

"Will you move? We're running late."

"Late for what? What the fuck's going on?" Arthur saw the blow coming, and braced himself, turning his head into the blow when Edwin used the butt of his gun as a club.

* * *

The first thing Merlin did was text Will.

_If Freya or Bryn or anybody asks tell them I quit army long time ago n u haven't seem me in a while will explain l8r_

Merlin was nearly at the stairs down to the Underground when a very important thought occurred to him. He should have told Arthur, "Fuck the car, we'll pick it up later, come on, let's get the hell out of here."

But instead, he'd left Arthur to make his way back to the surroundings of the Lockdown all on his own. Like the idiot Arthur kept telling him he was. He hoped, and hoped some more, that Arthur had parked his car _far_ from the Lockdown, that he wouldn't have to go past the building at all.

He couldn't believe it. He was so stupid. Merlin banged his fist against his forehead. That was how Freya was keeping control of her monster -- Bryn was _feeding_ her by controlling her surroundings, by letting her dance in a drowning swath of magic that numbed her senses and _made everything okay_ , because when she woke up, she hadn't killed anyone.

That she knew of.

Merlin needed to do something. But how? And what could he do? He'd sensed enough magic in that building to choke him. Some of it was Bryn's, some of it was Freya's, but the rest of it came from a half-dozen people who were setting up wards to keep people from leaving the club, to keep them serene and docile, so that they could lead each and every one of them like lambs to the slaughter just because Freya hadn't listened to Merlin all those years ago and learned how to control her monster.

_Oh, Gods. Oh, Gods._

Merlin paced back and forth, back and forth, and tried for casual when a police car passed by, detouring and heading down the stairs. If he hadn't been wringing his hands together with the absolute, complete absurdity of the last hour, he was wringing his hands now like they were each poor, twisted dishtowels, and he wouldn't stop until he emerged on the other side of the next station and saw Arthur safe and sound, waiting for him.

The platform was nearly deserted. There were a couple of kids doing their best imitation of conjoined twins with the misfortune of being stuck together at the lips. There was a harried businessman in a suit with a loosened tie, and Merlin couldn't help but think that the man didn't look half as good in a suit as Arthur did in his. A couple of blue-collar thick-necks were at the far end of the platform, big round barrel chests sticking out of their too-small jackets, grey peppering their hair and red bursting out on their noses in anticipation of the next bar's drinks.

Merlin's phone rang. He almost dropped it in his haste to get it out of his pocket, almost lost it to the train tracks below. The caller display made his heart stop.

"Arthur!"

But there was no answer on the other end and his heart, suddenly heavy as a stone now that it wasn't beating anymore, dropped to the platform and cracked.

"Arthur?"

He could hear faint, distant voices over the phone. Merlin breathed in relief. Arthur must have arse-bumped his phone and somehow managed to ring Merlin's number, though the improbable odds of that happening were mind-boggling to calculate. He wavered between hanging up and listening in, just to keep a lifeline to Arthur until he saw Arthur at the next stop.

"...that you'd be difficult."

There was a pause, and... Merlin frowned. That didn't sound like Arthur.

"Will you move? We're running late."

"Late for what? What the fuck's going on?"

Merlin froze, eyes wide. That was Arthur's voice, strained, breathless, a reverberating wheeze, as if he were suffocating. There was no answer, not right away, only a struggle, a shuffle, and a swear.

"You wanted to know about the NWO? Well, now you're going to find out about the NWO up close and personal," the second voice said.

"You're with them, you bastard," Arthur snarled, but there was no volume to his voice. There was a sharp, heavy breath like he was drowning.

 _Arthur! Arthur!_ Merlin gasped, looking around, desperate, and he had no idea how he'd left the platform or how he'd reached the top of the stairs but he was there. He ran, blind, desperate, terrified, keeping the phone against his ear, afraid that was his only, fragile connection to Arthur.

"Not yet. Soon." A small pause was like the whistle of a nuclear bomb dropping from a great heights. "I'm protecting them, you know. Taking care of people like you asking too many questions. Keeping the puppet masters from finding out too much about us. They'll find out about us all right, when the time's right, when we're ready --"

"Ready for what?"

"Wouldn't you just like to know?"

A long, heart-wrenching pause was filled with the sounds of scuffling, of struggling.

"There's no use in fighting me," the other voice said. "You can't fight this. You're completely under my control --"

There was a sudden, gasping whumph, a pained grunt. It was followed by a loud crack of something solid against something soft, and Arthur cried out sharply in pain.

_Arthur! Arthur! Gods damn you, I told you to stay away from him, from the club --_

Merlin wasn't far. He couldn't be far. But he might as well have been a whole wide world away for all the good he was able to do Arthur now. Merlin ran faster, his legs burning, his feet stumbling on the cracks in the sidewalk and the dips in the road. He heard more sounds of struggling over the phone, and he couldn't help but reach out and will strength into Arthur.

_Keep fighting. Keep fighting. I'm almost there --_

There was a heavy groan. Merlin didn't know if it belonged to Arthur or the other guy. There were staggering footsteps and a dull thump.

"You fucking traitor," Arthur rasped.

"Don't you fucking call me a traitor. Do you see this? Do you? This is what I get for ten years of loyal service to the Crown? And my parents? Huh? Do you know about my parents? They were supposed to be protected, both of them. What did they get for their work? They were killed. _Killed_. Fucking Niedermann --"

"Olaf? What's he --" A deep, heavy pant, and Arthur finished with, "-- got to do with..."

"He worked with them. Screwed them over. Then he was my _handler_ ," the other voice said. "This! This is because of him! It's never going to heal!"

Merlin remembered the man Arthur had been sitting with. Could picture him despite the dark. He could see the scars on the man's face in his mind's memory. Merlin didn't know who Olaf was, but the other man had a serious revenge hard-on.

"You're my payback, golden boy. He's been grooming you your whole life, and I've had to fucking listen to it. After everything I've ever done for him --"

Merlin heard an incantation over the phone, the words low and deep and guttural. Whatever the spell was meant to do, it was interrupted by a blow.

Another scuffle. More fighting. The struggling seemed less now, as if whatever was holding Arthur had sapped his energy and he didn't have much more left to fight with. Everything fell to abrupt silence after a reverberating clang. Footsteps retreated, someone gasped, panting for breath, and Merlin heard, "God _damn_ it. More trouble than you're worth, Pendragon."

There was no response.

_Arthur. Arthur!_

Merlin would give his left nut to hear Arthur right now, but he didn't make a single sound. Merlin couldn't even hear him breath.

And finally, finally, Merlin was there, on the road in front of the Lockdown. It was absolutely, completely deserted. The front doors to the club were barred shut, the streetlights were flickering, a blast of wind sent a scattering of newspapers and fast food wrappers across the street. There was no sign of Arthur. No sign of the man with the scar.

Merlin pressed the phone to his ear, but there wasn't anything. No noises. Just the occasional grunt and scrape.

He stared at the Lockdown.

Dread made his stomach flutter. It was washed away with pure rage. His magic roared in his ears, making his skin tingle, making the flickering streetlights go black for a brief moment, then turn on with abrupt, sudden, sun-bright light.

He didn't care about the tourists who should have known better than to go out clubbing in the seediest part of town. He didn't care about the NWO and their fantastic delusions of grandeur. He definitely didn't care about Bryn, who was the biggest bullying pillock in the universe who couldn't help but hurt other people when it suited him and take advantage of everyone else. And suddenly, suddenly, he didn't care about Freya. All the responsibility that he felt for her as a child broke away with the sound of chains shattering under crisp, cold ice. Merlin had tried to help her. Freya didn't want his help. She'd made her bed.

If she hurt Arthur, Merlin was going to bury her in it.

Merlin marched toward the solid steel doors. He jerked back his hand at the electrifying feel of the barricading wards. He pushed through it, slicing the magical shield with scything sweep of magic, ready for a horde of angry sorcerers to stream out at him the instant they sensed the broken wards.

Except there was no reaction. He could see the ward repair itself.

Merlin grasped the handle, twisting it, trying to get it open before the ward was completely rebuilt.

Locked. The door was locked.

_Fuck._

Only in the fucking modern world would anyone even think of physically locking the door when there was a magic ward that could keep out a battering ram.

With the ward down, he could hear the music blasting through. The DJ never stopped playing the techno at full volume, probably to drown out the screams in case the wards failed, to keep the locals from happening by on a late-night stroll with their little white purebred Westies or pound puppies and calling the coppers on them.

Merlin was ready to blast the doors open when something clicked.

He could hear music through the steel doors.

He couldn't hear any through the phone. If Arthur were inside...

Merlin took a step away from the building, scanning the streets. There was no sign of them.

_Arthur. Arthur, where are you?_

And he knew.

He hurried the length of the building. He crept around the corner, down the alley's mouth. He saw a beaten and bruised metal rubbish bin that looked as if it had gotten a few fresh dents. There were soft grunts in the distance, and in the wash of the streetlights behind him, under the glow of orange lighting right outside the building's rearward doors, Merlin saw him.

The man with the scar.

And Arthur.

The man was dragging an unconscious Arthur along the ground. He was loose limbed dead weight, and the other man was struggling.

"Can't lift him?" Merlin asked, abandoning any pretence of stealth. He couldn't help it. All he could think of was Arthur, pale, bloodied, bruised. He had a cut lip. A scrape along his jaw. A black eye forming around his left eye. "You need a hand?"

The man startled and straightened, dropping Arthur to the ground.

"What are you going to do with him?"

The man shrugged, unconcerned. "I was worried for my mate. I was taking him inside, check to see if he's all right."

"Yeah?" Merlin glanced toward the rear exit doors, walking closer. "Weren't going to use him for the party? I mean, weren't he your ticket in?"

A twitch in expression -- somewhere between glee and satisfaction and contempt -- creased the frown on the man's face. "You know about that?"

When Merlin didn't answer, coming closer instead, the man laughed.

"Of course you do. You're chummy with Bryn. I've been around for months. I've never seen you. Who are you?"

Merlin shrugged a shoulder, shooting a furtive glance at Arthur. His eyes were closed, his face a mottle of bruises, his body constricted onto itself, as if he were being held together by invisible mummy wrappings. He was breathing. His chest didn't expand out fully, but he was breathing.

_Thank fuck._

Merlin had to get him out of the way. Had to keep him safe. Had to keep him from seeing what Merlin was about to do.

The man straightened, a grin tugging at his lips. He took a step over Arthur, putting himself between them. "You're an original, aren't you? One of the ones who started all this? At the very least, one of the other ones, like Bryn?"

"No," Merlin said. "I'm the one who's going to stop you."

Merlin raised a hand and pushed Arthur further back, far away, nearly at the other end of the alley, out of range. He crushed together two of the oversized rubbish bins loitering near the mouth of the narrow street, a feeble barrier meant to protect Arthur.

The man's grin faded. He incanted sharply and swung his body, his arm whipping the air. Merlin was knocked against the wall, picked up and tossed on the other side, and again in a zigzag motion that left him rattled and dazed and howling in pain when he crumpled from a great height onto the asphalt, landing on the balls of his feet only by luck of the draw, only to come crashing onto his knee a second later and rolling onto his side with a grunt. He shook his head to clear it.

It didn't help. He thought he saw fire.

He blinked several times, everything was out of focus, but one thing stood out.

It _was_ fire.

The flames spread from a pin point, encircling him completely, feeding off of the man's magical fuel until the ring was as tall as his knees, and in the next breath, if he dared take a step in any direction, he would be wading hip-deep and waist-deep in fire. There was no smoke, only heat, and the icy chill of night was gone, warming him to the bone.

Cooking him.

The man glanced over his shoulder and saw that Arthur had been pushed away, stuffed behind a warped metal barrier. "You're one of us."

"I'm not." _Not like you. Never like you._

"You can do magic." The man took a step closer while Merlin blinked his eyes, trying to make the two of _him_ combine into a single target. "You can do magic and you're not with us. You're daft."

"I... I am?"

"We're going to rule the world, and you're..."

"Oh, Gods, enough with that already. You talk a load of bollocks, you know. Don't you ever shut up?" Merlin held up his phone, the phone he'd held on tight to even in all the carnage, even as he was being bandied about as if he were a ping pong ball, because it was his lifeline to Arthur. "I already heard everything."

Every sort of alley debris went flying at Merlin. A bent hubcap. Discarded beer cans. Broken bottles.

Merlin deflected the ones that came too close. The man's aim was shite. He could toss a bucket full of pennies at Merlin from a foot away and miss.

With a hiss of frustration, the man moved on to bigger targets. The metal lid to a round rubbish bin. The rubbish bin. A second rubbish bin after that, and another, and another, until they came square at Merlin, knocked aside, each one, until the man ran out of ammunition.

He moved to something else.

Black rubbish bags were next, and there were _hundreds_ of them piled in a pyramid under a fire escape, dozens more scattered throughout the full length of the alley, old, abandoned, forgotten, because the utility people didn't come this deep into forbidden territory unless they absolutely had to.

Merlin knocked them all aside until he had the bright idea of using them to douse the fire ring.

A black rubbish bag promptly caught fire as it passed through the ring, bursting like an overripe melon and spilling half-decomposed and completely rotten refuse at his feet, cooking on the hot asphalt, filling the air with the stink of sewage and garbage dump and Will's dirty socks one month after gym class.

Merlin gagged.

The plastic landed on the fire and burned. Enough rubbish had come flying, only to be knocked down onto the ring of fire, dousing some of the flames -- flames that rose up persistently, scorching through the rubbish, closing the circle again.

More and more of the garbage came at him, the bags older and weaker and splitting open every time Merlin tried to push them aside, and there was a smokescreen of tissue paper and bits of newspaper and food wrappers and crumpled containers that rained down on top of him and all around him and --

Merlin shouted a _word_ , and a strong wind blasted the falling garbage out of his line of sight, nearly blew out the flames, forced the man to take a step back, and pushed the crumpled rubbish bins protecting Arthur a couple of inches further.

That was when Merlin saw the gun in the man's hand.

It was reflex. All those drills with Gaius. It was an instinctive surge of power that slowed down time, and Merlin could see the bullet come at him. He didn't think. He reacted. He caught the bullet and flung it at a target.

At the man with the scar.

* * *

"Arthur. Arthur."

Something stung his face.

Something stung the _other_ side of his face.

"Quit faking. Come on, Arthur. We have to _go!_ "

Arthur went from complete utter unconsciousness to being warily aware of his surroundings and came suddenly awake, grabbing the very slim wrists of the callused hands that were slapping him, twisting his body to manhandle the offending person, creature, _thing_ until Arthur had the advantage. Adrenaline gave him that strength, helped him ignore the dull aches and pains, and made him completely unaware that he was about to beat Merlin to a pulp until he opened his eyes and saw a very frightened Merlin under him.

"It's me! Arthur, it's me!"

_He came._

Arthur's relief was palpable. He stared down at Merlin as if he didn't quite believe it. He'd been so sure that he was done for, that this bastard of a traitor that Olaf had sent him to was going to kill him for some sort of _sacrifice_ that was supposed to buy him a full-time, permanent membership to the very exclusive NWO.

If there had been any doubt in his mind that Merlin couldn't be trusted -- and there hadn't been, not for a second -- that doubt would be gone now. Instead, all Arthur felt was the complete, irreversible confidence that no matter what, Merlin would be there for him.

_Thank God._

As if that realization neutralized the adrenaline coursing through his body, Arthur sagged heavily, his back bowing, catching himself from falling completely on top of Merlin with his hand on the gravelly asphalt, his weight crashing on his left elbow and knee before he rolled off completely, laying down side-by-side next to Merlin and wanting nothing better for this bad dream to be _over right now_.

There was a cold rush of air next to him, the blur of shadows in the dim alley lighting, and Merlin was on his feet with what sounded like a grimace of pain, faint, but still loud enough for Arthur to drop his arm from where it had fallen to cover his eyes, and he saw Merlin, pale, more pale than usual, his T-shirt torn and stained. Blood was on the blues of his jeans where his jeans were torn at one knee, and he balanced his weight on his good leg as he reached down for Arthur.

"Arthur. Come on. We can't stay here. It's gone to shite --"

Arthur jerked to a sitting position, narrowly missing hitting his head against Merlin's, looking around but seeing nothing but the dark of the alley where someone had slapped two dumpsters together to block the way on one end, the open road with a flickering streetlamp on the other. "Edwin?"

He used Merlin's arm to haul himself to his feet, his ribs aching as if every single one of them had been readjusted to curl inward, shrinking him a full dress size, and breathing, really breathing, was a blessing that he thought he'd never have again. Merlin's arm draped under his shoulder, his hand around his waist, and it was a bit awkward because Merlin was a little taller than he was and his leg was hurting him, but they both managed to stand.

"Dead," Merlin said, the word strangled.

"Good," Arthur said, and took another deep breath, recoiling slightly. " _Mer_ lin. You reek."

"Yeah," Merlin huffed, trying to laugh but falling short. "There was a fight. I... Uh, I landed in some rubbish."

" _Honestly_ , Merlin. Only you could land in rubbish," Arthur said, shaking his head, a pained chuckle escaping.

"Where's your car?" Merlin asked. "We really, _really_ have to go. Before they come out of the club and..."

Merlin made a gesture just past the dumpster. Arthur suddenly wanted to see what was there.

"A block down, past the Lockout," Arthur said, and Merlin groaned a little, but they swivelled around and gingerly worked their way past the crumpled dumpsters -- dumpsters that looked like they fit together like a jigsaw puzzle, but that had been pried apart so that someone could get through.

The first thing Arthur saw was Edwin, a gun inches from his hand, face-down in a puddle.

"You shot him?"

"Yeah, I... Uh, I got the gun away from him."

Arthur nodded in approval. On the one hand, it wasn't Merlin's gun, or Arthur's gun, or anyone's gun and wouldn't be traceable. On the other, Edwin had a good stone or two on Merlin, and he had _magic_. So, how in the bloody _hell_...?

Merlin must have caught the attempting-to-do-math look on his face, because he added, "Remind me to thank Morowitz."

"Did you wipe them? Your fingerprints --"

"I took care of it," Merlin said, his words firm.

Arthur looked around. "What about cameras?"

"Aren't any. I looked."

They made it past the burning ring of debris, of loose garbage, of scorched plastic, but by that point Arthur was being determinedly dragged away from the alley, and a hitch in his breath caught every time Merlin stumbled and neither one of them were sure at that instant who was supporting the other. The question came and went by the time they reached the car because Arthur decided that he really didn't care and didn't want to know because he was still processing everything that happened.

"Give me the keys," Merlin said, pulling Arthur toward the passenger side. Arthur determinedly headed for the driver's side.

"You're not driving."

"I'm driving," Merlin insisted.

"You're hurt." As if on cue, Merlin stumbled, and Arthur tightened his arm around Merlin's waist. Under any other circumstance, he would be over the moon right now to be this close to Merlin. Now, however, he just wanted to lay down and sleep until the last few hours were nothing but a bad memory.

"It's just my knee. I can still shift gears," Merlin said, rolling his eyes. "Besides, I'm not letting _you_ drive. You might have a concussion. You were _unconscious_. Besides, what's the worst that could happen? I strip the gears a little if my knee gives out, compared to you passing out at the wheel and wrapping us around a pole?"

If he was operating at full efficiency, he would've come up with a suitable counter-argument, but instead, Arthur pressed his free hand against his throbbing temple, unsure if he should blame the pain on Merlin's rapid-fire blathering or on the blows he'd taken to the head. He gave Merlin the keys, and tried very hard not to grit his teeth when the engine started sounding funny.

The drive was quiet for the first few kilometres -- Arthur didn't want to distract Merlin while he first figured out the gears, then sorted out his coordination. He was biding his time, shifting in his seat, adjusting the angle to take some of the ache from his ribs, but Merlin answered his question before he could even ask it, his eyes fixed square on the road ahead.

"It were Will," Merlin said. "Remember when we got back and Will came to meet us on that off-base bar? I asked him about the shite we used to hear when we were kids, about the new world order, yeah? I mean, he was kind of a toff back then, hung out with me and hung out with them for a bit until they started to, well..."

Merlin trailed off and Arthur didn't need Merlin to say the words to hear _pick on me and beat me up and shove my head down the loo_.

"Freya was a friend of mine -- the girl I was talking to back there. I used to look out for her. She was worse off than I was, but she got what she wanted from me and went after Bryn. Bryn was the guy in the booth. He's one of the ones who started talking all that load of bollocks about changing the way of life and..."

It was a long story short, complete with embarrassing admissions of "couch-surfing" (technically true) and the damning deal that Bryn had made to crack codes for the NWO for a year to see if he were worthy, then to bring him to the fold. It all rang true to Arthur, because Edwin had hinted something of the same, except for Edwin it was keeping the agencies from getting too close, too much information on them until they were ready. And, more worrisome was the feeling that they were close, very close, to being ready.

Arthur swallowed hard. "Back there. What was happening back there that you were in a rush to get out?"

Merlin tore his eyes from the road for three dangerous seconds, the terror glaring and painful, and Arthur shook his head.

"Never mind. I don't think I want to know."

They arrived after several detours ("I'm not lost, I'm trying to shake anyone tailing us"), and by that time, Arthur was able to move under his own power. Merlin, however, was still limping.

They went inside. Merlin followed Arthur to the living room, and Arthur sat heavily on the couch, every ache and pain coming back in spades, and he braced himself against the arm of the couch, staring at the wall.

He was out of his depth. Completely, wholly, out of his depth. He thought he could handle Aredian and the Jester and Mordred. That, because he could handle it, his team would be able to handle it, too.

He didn't think that anymore. He'd seen magic up close and personal. He'd _felt_ magic up close and personal.

And after that, Arthur had come to several realizations.

The first was that with magic, it wouldn't have taken much for Edwin to have killed him. For _anyone_ with magic to have killed him.

The second was that there was no way of telling who had magic and who didn't. It could be anyone. It could be his father's personal assistant -- an older, stern, capable woman who was as severe as Uther but only half as frightening. It could be the bloke who made the coffee that Arthur picked up every morning for Merlin. It could even be Merlin.

The third was that without Merlin, he would have been charred toast, or worse.

Arthur wasn't a man to back down from a challenge, even one as incomprehensible and as impossible as this one.

Magic.

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Merlin standing at the edge of the couch, unsure whether to sit down or go. Arthur was struck by a moment of blood-cold panic, of terrifying fear, but he'd never admit it.

"Merlin," he began, proud that his voice was calm and even, wanting Merlin to stay, to sit, to be close. He wanted to say _thank you_ and _I'd have been fucked if you hadn't come back_. He couldn't say the words.

Merlin seemed to understand anyway, because he limped over to the couch and sat down next to Arthur, close enough that their thighs brushed together. It was an electric shock of contact that warmed and reassured Arthur, and the fear, powerful and paralyzing and bigger than Arthur, started to fade.

He didn't know how long they sat there in silence, staring at the blank wall, at the dark television screen. Slowly, ever so slowly, Arthur got a grip and started to make a plan.

It would start with calling Olaf about the mess he'd gotten Arthur into, and where to go to clean it up.

Somewhere after that, Merlin and Arthur would go in to debrief MI-5 with everything they'd learned about the NWO and use the contact that Merlin had made with them to find out what they were planning to do.

And it would end -- or rather, it would begin -- with Excalibur returning to active duty.

To war. To the _real_ war. The war that he had no idea how to prepare for.

Arthur stretched an arm out and draped it around Merlin's shoulders, giving him a rough shake.

"Make yourself useful, yeah? Grab me an ice pack. Wash my shirt. And go shower. For the love of God, Merlin, you'll make my flat smell like a tip."

**Author's Note:**

>   
>  Please contact me for permission before writing anything in the Loaded March AU, or see [here](http://loaded-march.livejournal.com/46614.html) for my stance on derivative works.  
> 

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [ART - for Loaded March by Footloose](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5377829) by [inkysand](https://archiveofourown.org/users/inkysand/pseuds/inkysand)




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